Product Code: ICAL07_705

The Contribution of Prof. Akira Matsunawa to the Understanding of Laser Welding Process
Authors:
Remy Fabbro, LALP (CNRS)/GIP GERAILP; Arcueil Cedex France
Presented at ICALEO 2007

Among his various contributions in the domain of laser processing of materials, the laser community agrees to recognize that Prof. A Matsunawa has been a leading contributor to the understanding of the laser welding process since more than 25 years. It is interesting to note that his contribution to this field was realized in conjunction with the constant development of the ICALEO Conference during the same period, where he made his main presentations of scientific results during a continuous and regular participation to this conference. Quite 25 years ago, Prof. Matsunawa had already described the set of problems concerning some of the main physical processes involved in laser welding that himself, with his main collaborators, and a complete generation of researchers throughout the world have analyzed and studied later on. It is the evolution of his contribution along this period that we will describe, mainly based on the analysis of the proceedings to the ICALEO Conference, and we will see how his analysis of several main processes such as plasma effects, hydrodynamics problems, keyhole dynamics were precursory and accurate.