Femtosecond laser writing of buried graphitic structures in bulk diamond

Diamond samples are irradiated with 140fs pulses of 800nm wavelength. The pulse repetition rate is 1kHz. In the focal region of the irradiated pulses the diamond is transformed to graphite. The writing of graphitic wires along the incident beam is studied experimentally. Atechnique to produce buried graphitic wires with constant diameter is described. Diameters can be selected between 1.5μm and 10μm. The wire length is up to 680μm. The writing speed is typically between 1μm s−1 and 30μm s−