  Laser writing of materials is normally performed by the sequential scanning
of a single focused beam across a sample. This process is time-consuming and it
can severely limit the throughput of laser systems in key applications such as
surgery, microelectronics, or manufacturing. Here we report a parallelization
strategy based on ultrasound waves in a liquid to diffract light into multiple
beamlets. Adjusting amplitude, frequency, or phase of ultrasound allows tunable
multi-focus distributions with sub-microsecond control. When combined with
sample translation, the dynamic splitting of light leads to high-throughput
laser processing, as demonstrated by locally modifying the morphological and
wettability properties of metals, polymers, and ceramics. The results
illustrate how acousto-optofluidic systems are universal tools for fast
multi-focus generation, with potential impact in fields such as imaging or
optical trapping.
