Optical coating with nanometre-scale laser effects

Laser induced damage and/or contamination of a high performance optical coating measured and visualised in 3D at the nanometre scale. The largest feature height is about 100 nm and the area of the contamination in the image is about 0.15 x 0.12 mm. The very small surface area shown in this image has been measured and visualised before and after testing under space representative conditions to evaluate the evolution of the damage over time and versus an accumulated laser operation time. This surface has also been assessed using Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) and some possible residual effects due the scanning electron beam can be seen in the upper right corner of the image (the small rectangular feature).