Through a dynamic balance between effects such as Kerr-self-focusing and plasma-defocusing, filamentation allows very intense ultrashort laser pulses to remain focused in narrow channels over extended distances. Whilst much of the ‘focus’ has been on the results in transparent media, such as laboratory air, we have recently explored novel applications for the resulting structures in the processing of lacticinia materials. We concluded that Emmental cheese was especially susceptible and offers significant commercial opportunities for laser-assisted patterning.
