Dynamics of liquid nanodroplet formation in nanosecond laserablation of metals

The laser ablation mechanisms of metallic targets leading to liquid nanodroplet ejection are of wide interest both from a fundamental point of view and for applications in various fields, especially whennanoparticle synthesis is required. The phase explosion process was recognized as the driving mechanismof the expulsion of a mixture of vapor and liquid nanodroplets in the short pulse laser ablation of metals.A model based on thermodynamics that links the theory of homogeneous vapor bubble nucleation tothe size distribution of the generated liquid nanoclusters has been recently proposed. The present workaims to take a step ahead to remove some assumptions made in previous work. Here an improved com-putational approach allows us to describe time-dependent nucleation in a homogeneous system with notemperature spatial gradients under nanosecond laser irradiation. Numerical results regarding the sizedistribution of formed liquid clusters and the time evolution of the process are shown for aluminum,iron, cobalt, nickel, copper, silver and gold. Connections with experimental data and molecular dynamicssimulations, when available from literature, are reported and discussed.