This paper reviews our work on the application of ultrafast pulsed laser micro/nanoprocessing for the three-dimensional (3D) biomimetic modification of materials surfaces. It is shown that the artificial surfaces obtained by femtosecond-laser processing of Si in reactive gas atmosphere exhibit roughness at both micro- and nanoscales that mimics the hierarchical morphology of natural surfaces. Along with the spatial control of the topology, defining surface chemistry provides materials exhibiting notable wetting characteristics which are potentially useful for open microfluidic applications. Depending on the functional coating deposited on the laser patterned 3D structures, we can achieve artificial surfaces that are (a) of extremely low surface energy, thus water-repellent and self-cleaned, and (b) responsive, i.e., showing the ability to change their surface energy in response to different external stimuli such as light, electric field, and $p\text{H}$ . Moreover, the behavior of different kinds of cells cultured on laser engineered substrates of various wettabilities was investigated. Experiments showed that it is possible to preferentially tune cell adhesion and growth through choosing proper combinations of surface topography and chemistry. It is concluded that the laser textured 3D micro/nano-Si surfaces with controllability of roughness ratio and surface chemistry can advantageously serve as a novel means to elucidate the 3D cell-scaffold interactions for tissue engineering applications.

The possibility of phase manipulation and temporal tailoring of ultrashort laser pulses provides new opportunities for optimal processing of materials. An experimental demonstration of the technique that shows the possibility to design excitation sequences tailored with respect to the material response is presented, laying the groundwork for adaptive optimization in material structuring. The technique is particularly suitable to generate controllable ion beams by ultrafast laser ablation. Silicon samples irradiated with multiple laser pulses separated by the phase-transformation time show increased ion emission efficiency with different energetic signatures correlated to a cleaner aspect of the laser-induced structures on the surface.

We report the growth of thin films of the ferromagnetic half-Heusler alloy NiMnSb by pulsed-laser deposition on Si (111) and polycrystalline InAs substrates. Highly crystalline films are grown using low substrate temperatures $\text{(190–210\hspace{0.05em}°}\mathrm{C}\mathrm{),}$ without any postdeposition annealing. The structural, magnetic, and transport properties of the films are relatively consistent with those of the bulk NiMnSb used as target, which suggests that thin layers of this material grown by laser ablation could be used in multilayer structures as effective spin-polarized conducting layers.