Fabrication of single-crystalline microspheres with high sphericity from anisotropic materials

Glassy Microspheres for Energy Applications

Microspheres made of glass, polymer, or crystal material have been largely used in many application areas, extending from paints to lubricants, to cosmetics, biomedicine, optics and photonics, just to mention a few. Here the focus is on the applications of glassy microspheres in the field of energy, namely covering issues related to their use in solar cells, in hydrogen storage, in nuclear fusion, but also as high-temperature insulators or proppants for shale oil and gas recovery. An overview is provided of the fabrication techniques of bulk and hollow microspheres, as well as of the excellent results made possible by the peculiar properties of microspheres. Considerations about their commercial relevance are also added.

Inner structure of ZnO microspheres fabricated via laser ablation in superfluid helium

ZnO microspheres fabricated via laser ablation in superfluid helium were found to have bubble-like voids. Even a microsphere demonstrating clear whispering gallery mode resonances in the luminescence had voids. Our analysis confirmed that some voids are located away from the surface and have negligible or little effect on the whispering gallery mode resonances since the electromagnetic energy localizes near the surface of these microspheres. The existence of the voids indicates that helium gas or any evaporated target material was present within the molten microparticles during the microsphere formation.

Laser Synthesis and Processing of Colloids: Fundamentals and Applications

Driven by functionality and purity demand for applications of inorganic nanoparticle colloids in optics, biology, and energy, their surface chemistry has become a topic of intensive research interest. Consequently, ligand-free colloids are ideal reference materials for evaluating the effects of surface adsorbates from the initial state for application-oriented nanointegration purposes. After two decades of development, laser synthesis and processing of colloids (LSPC) has emerged as a convenient and scalable technique for the synthesis of ligand-free nanomaterials in sealed environments. In addition to the high-purity surface of LSPC-generated nanoparticles, other strengths of LSPC include its high throughput, convenience for preparing alloys or series of doped nanomaterials, and its continuous operation mode, suitable for downstream processing. Unscreened surface charge of LSPC-synthesized colloids is the key to achieving colloidal stability and high affinity to biomolecules as well as support materials, thereby enabling the fabrication of bioconjugates and heterogeneous catalysts. Accurate size control of LSPC-synthesized materials ranging from quantum dots to submicrometer spheres and recent upscaling advancement toward the multiple-gram scale are helpful for extending the applicability of LSPC-synthesized nanomaterials to various fields. By discussing key reports on both the fundamentals and the applications related to laser ablation, fragmentation, and melting in liquids, this Article presents a timely and critical review of this emerging topic.

Germanium Sub-Microspheres Synthesized by Picosecond Pulsed Laser Melting in Liquids: Educt Size Effects

Pulsed laser melting in liquid (PLML) has emerged as a facile approach to synthesize submicron spheres (SMSs) for various applications. Typically lasers with long pulse durations in the nanosecond regime are used. However, recent findings show that during melting the energy absorbed by the particle will be dissipated promptly after laser-matter interaction following the temperature decrease within tens of nanoseconds and hence limiting the efficiency of longer pulse widths. Here, the feasibility to utilize a picosecond laser to synthesize Ge SMSs (200~1000 nm in diameter) is demonstrated by irradiating polydisperse Ge powders in water and isopropanol. Through analyzing the educt size dependent SMSs formation mechanism, we find that Ge powders (200~1000 nm) are directly transformed into SMSs during PLML via reshaping, while comparatively larger powders (1000~2000 nm) are split into daughter SMSs via liquid droplet bisection. Furthermore, the contribution of powders larger than 2000 nm and smaller than 200 nm to form SMSs is discussed. This work shows that compared to nanosecond lasers, picosecond lasers are also suitable to produce SMSs if the pulse duration is longer than the material electron-phonon coupling period to allow thermal relaxation.

Size and morphology dependent evolution of resonant modes in ZnO microspheres grown by hydrothermal synthesis

We report the correlation between inner morphology, size and whispering gallery mode (WGM) behavior in ZnO microspheres (MSs) grown by hydrothermal method. WGMs in different ZnO microspheres with diameters in the range of 2 - 6 μm were analyzed by a modified refractive index (MRI) scheme. We found that the size dependence of WGMs in our system is more complicated than others because of the appearance of porosity inside each sphere. Such features might account for the refractive index change and peak shift. Despite that, our MRI scheme can detect such complex features and reproduce universal relations between all important quantities of a microsphere WGM resonator.

Biosensing by WGM Microspherical Resonators

Whispering gallery mode (WGM) microresonators, thanks to their unique properties, have allowed researchers to achieve important results in both fundamental research and engineering applications. Among the various geometries, microspheres are the simplest 3D WGM resonators; the total optical loss in such resonators can be extremely low, and the resulting extraordinarily high Q values of 10⁸–10⁹ lead to high energy density, narrow resonant-wavelength lines and a lengthy cavity ringdown. They can also be coated in order to better control their properties or to increase their functionality. Their very high sensitivity to changes in the surrounding medium has been exploited for several sensing applications: protein adsorption, trace gas detection, impurity detection in liquids, structural health monitoring of composite materials, detection of electric fields, pressure sensing, and so on. In the present paper, after a general introduction to WGM resonators, attention is focused on spherical microresonators, either in bulk or in bubble format, to their fabrication, characterization and functionalization. The state of the art in the area of biosensing is presented, and the perspectives of further developments are discussed.

Layered Seed-Growth of AgGe Football-like Microspheres via Precursor-Free Picosecond Laser Synthesis in Water

Hybrid particles are of great significance in terms of their adjustable optical, electronic, magnetic, thermal and mechanical properties. As a novel technique, laser ablation in liquids (LAL) is famous for its precursor-free, "clean" synthesis of hybrid particles with various materials. Till now, almost all the LAL-generated particles originate from the nucleation-growth mechanism. Seed-growth of particles similar to chemical methods seems difficult to be achieved by LAL. Here, we not only present novel patch-joint football-like AgGe microspheres with a diameter in the range of 1 ~ 7 μm achievable by laser ablation in distilled water but also find direct evidences of their layered seed growth mechanism. Many critical factors contribute to the formation of AgGe microspheres: fast laser-generated plasma process provide an excellent condition for generating large amount of Ge and Ag ions/atoms, their initial nucleation and galvanic replacement reaction, while cavitation bubble confinement plays an important role for the increase of AgGe nuclei and subsequent layered growth in water after bubble collapse. Driven by work function difference, Ge acts as nucleation agent for silver during alloy formation. This new seed-growth mechanism for LAL technique opens new opportunities to develop a large variety of novel hybrid materials with controllable properties.