On the breakup of patterned nanoscale copper rings into droplets via pulsed-laser-induced dewetting: competing liquid-phase instability and transport mechanisms.

Nanolithographically patterned copper rings were synthesized, and the self-assembly of the rings into ordered nanoparticle/nanodrop arrays was accomplished via nanosecond pulsed laser heating above the melt threshold. The resultant length scale was correlated to the transport and instability growths that occur during the liquid lifetime of the melted copper rings. For 13-nm-thick rings, a change in the nanoparticle spacing with the ring width is attributed to a transition from a Raleigh-Plateau instability to a thin film instability because of competition between the cumulative transport and instability timescales. To explore the competition between instability mechanisms further, we carried out experiments with 7-nm-thick rings. In agreement with the theoretical predictions, these rings break up in both the azimuthal and radial directions, confirming that a simple hydrodynamic model captures the main features of the processes leading to the breakup.