Analyzing chemical reaction dynamics from laser-induced shock of energetic materials by mass spectrometry

The aim of this research is to explore decomposition dynamics of energetic materials (EMs) following laser-induced shock. Here we develop a mass spectrometry (MS) instrument capable of measuring ionized products from both single- and double-pulse laser ablation of thin films of EMs with femtosecond lasers. Tuning the pulse width from hundreds of femtoseconds to tens of picoseconds allows probing the transition from purely electronic excitation to electron-phonon coupling. Double pulse excitation with time delays ranging from hundreds of femtoseconds to microseconds additionally allows for probing the evolution of the product distributions over time scales spanning many orders of magnitude. Preliminary MS results on model EMs will be presented.