Mechanisms and processes of pulsed laser ablation in liquids during nanoparticle production

In the last decade Pulsed Laser Ablation in Liquids (PLAL) has been widely investigated from the fundamental point of view, and various theories have been proposed. Although many important achievements have been obtained by the scientific community, many aspects still need to be clarified and many contradictions arise when comparing the interpretation of similar experiments carried out by different authors. In this paper we have reconsidered previous works focused on specific processes and stages of the PLAL, in order to outline a modern and comprehensive point of view of the overall physical aspects of PLAL. With this aim, several simultaneous diagnostic methods have been applied during the production of metallic nanoparticles (NPs), i.e. optical emission spectroscopy and fast imaging for the investigation of the laser-induced plasma, shadowgraph for the study of the cavitation bubble, and Double Pulse Laser Ablation in Liquid (DP-LAL) and laser scattering for the investigation of NPs location and mechanisms of release in solution. The connection between the various stages of the DP-LAL allows understanding the main characteristics of the produced NPs and the typical timescales of the basic mechanisms involved in PLAL.