A computational model for laser-induced Wagner oxidation processes on a vanadium metal surface is described and compared with the experiment. It is found that for thin oxide layers, the oxide is nearly transparent and the metal temperature rapidly increases. For thicker layers, the oxide is nearly opaque and the metal temperature slowly decreases. The Wagner rate law is found to hold for thicker oxide layers, but not at the beginning of the process.

Electronic contributions to the optical (hyper)polarizabilities of small silicon clusters are theoretically determined. Geometries and the electronic structures of the clusters are established using the tight-binding model. The nonlinear polarizabilities are found to depend primarily on the symmetry of the cluster and prove to be high for the low-symmetry clusters. Possible experiments and applications are discussed.

This paper discusses the behavior of currents and fields along a structured superconductor. First the effect of surface structure on supercurrents is investigated. Then the effect of structure on the critical nucleation field is discussed in two cases, one with the magnetic field parallel to the ripples and the other with the field parallel to the grating wavenumber. In the first case, it is found that the critical field is reduced as a function of grating height, whereas in the latter case it is increased. Finally, the relevance of this work for laser-induced chemistry above a superconducting surface is discussed. The Ginzburg-Landau model is used throughout.