Convection

Physics

Nanotechnology

Pure mathematics

Mathematics

Laser

Mechanics

Optics

Diffraction

Materials science

Surface (topology)

Geometry

Electromagnetic field

Quantum mechanics

Field (mathematics)

Marangoni effect

Laser & Photonics Review

Surface nanostructuring enables the manipulation of many essential surface properties. With the recent rapid advancements in laser technology, a contactless large‐area processing at rates of up to m 2 s −1 becomes feasible that allows new industrial applications in medicine, optics, tribology, biology, etc. On the other hand, the last two decades enable extremely successful and intense research in the field of so‐called laser‐induced periodic surface structures (LIPSS, ripples). Different types of these structures featuring periods of hundreds of nanometers only—far beyond the optical diffraction limit—up to several micrometers are easily manufactured in a single‐step process and can be widely controlled by a proper choice of the laser processing conditions. From a theoretical point of view, however, a vivid and very controversial debate emerges, whether LIPSS originate from electromagnetic effects or are caused by matter reorganization. This article aims to close a gap in the available literature on LIPSS by reviewing the currently existent theories of LIPSS along with their numerical implementations and by providing a comparison and critical assessment of these approaches.

Maxwell Meets Marangoni—A Review of Theories on Laser‐Induced Periodic Surface Structures