This book originates from lectures delivered at the First International School "Laser-surface interactions for new materials production: tailoring structure and properties" that was held in San Servolo Island, Venice (Italy) from 13 to 20 July, 2008 under the direction of A. Miotello and P. M. Ossi. The purpose of the School was to provide the students (mainly PhD) with a compreh- sive overview of basic aspects and applications connected to the laser-matter interaction both to modify surface properties and to prepare new materials by pulsed laser deposition (PLD) at the nanometer scale. The ?eld is re- tively young and grewrapidly in the last 10 years because of the possibility of depositingvirtuallyanymaterial,includingmulti-component?lms,preserving the composition of the ablated target and generally avoiding post-deposition thermaltreatments. Inaddition,theexperimentalsetupforPLDiscompatible with in situ diagnostics of both the plasma and the growing ?lm.
The basic laser-surface interaction mechanisms, possibly in an ambient atmosphere, either chemically reactive or inert, are a challenge to sci- tists, while engineers are mostly interested in the characteristics of the deposited materials and the possibility of tailoring their properties through an appropriate tuning of the deposition parameters.