Regensburg 2016 – scientific programme

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O: Fachverband Oberflächenphysik

O 86: Ultrafast Surface Dynamics I

O 86.4: Talk

Thursday, March 10, 2016, 15:45–16:00, S052

Nonequilibrium electron dynamics in laser excited copper, silver and gold — •Sebastian Weber and Baerbel Rethfeld — Fachbereich Physik und Forschungszentrum OPTIMAS, TU Kaiserslautern, Germany

After excitation with an ultrashort laser pulse, the electrons in a metal are in a strong nonequilibrium state. During thermalization, they interact also with the lattice, transferring energy to the phonons. On the basis of complete Boltzmann-type collision integrals, a method allowing to treat materials with an arbitrary density of states has been developed [Phys. Rev. B 87, 035139 (2013)]. This method provides insights into the response of different material classes to ultrafast laser excitation. Here we focus on the study of noble metals which possess characteristic densities of states with an elevated area at a certain distance below the Fermi edge. The results show the thermalization of the electrons within a few femtoseconds. However, electron-phonon coupling hinders the electrons' complete thermalization as long as the temperature of both subsystems differ from each other.