Synthesis of submicron metastable phase of silicon using femtosecond laser-driven shock wave

We measured the grain size of metastable phase of Si synthesized by shock compression. We analyzed the crystalline structures of the femtosecond laser-driven shock compressed silicon with x-ray diffraction measurements. We found that submicron grains of metastable Si-VIII exist in the silicon. We suggest that the pressure loading time is too short for the nucleated high-pressure phases to grow in case of the femtosecond laser-driven shock compression, therefore Si-VIII grains of submicron size are obtained. We are expecting to discover other unique crystalline structures induced by the femtosecond laser-driven shock wave. (C) 2011 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3673591]