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US 9,000,361 B2Granted
Nanophotonic production, modulation and switching of ions by silicon microcolumn arrays
AssigneeThe George Washington University
InventorsAkos Vertes, Bennett N. Walker
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Abstract
The production and use of silicon microcolumn arrays that harvest light from a laser pulse to produce ions are described. The systems of the present invention seem to behave like a quasi-periodic antenna array with ion yields that show profound dependence on the plane of laser light polarization and the angle of incidence. By providing photonic ion sources, this enables enhanced control of ion production on a micro/nano scale and direct integration with miniaturized analytical devices.
Claims14
A device for controlling fragmentation and ion production from a sample, the device comprising:
- an array for receiving the sample, the array being made from a semiconductor material and having quasi-periodic columnar structures;
- wherein the array is configured to retain the sample and receive plane polarized radiation from a laser source;
- and
- wherein the columnar structures are configured so that when the angle of the plane polarization of the laser source approaches the angle of p-polarized radiation, the fragmentation and ion production from the sample is increased, and when the angle of the plane polarization of the laser source approaches the angle of s-polarized radiation, the fragmentation and ion production from the sample is decreased.
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Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.