Pulsed laser ablation of strained ring compounds deposited on metal rods has been found to result in preferential breaking of the strained bonds. Observed results are correlated to laser pulse heating at the metal surface, based on a 1-D surface heating model. Such a model predicts poor relative surface heating for Al surfaces; ablation experiments also show less preferential strained bond breaking on Al. The greatest degree of observed strained bond breaking correlates with good surface heating and the absence of any direct absorbance by the strained ring compound. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.