Related papers: Efficient modeling of laser plasma interactions in…
An integrated simulation approach fully based upon particle-in-cell (PIC) model is proposed, which involves both fast particle generation via laser solid-density plasma interaction and transport and energy deposition of the particles in…
Direct studies of intense laser-solid interactions is still of great challenges, because of the many coupled physical mechanisms, such as direct laser heating, ionization dynamics, collision among charged particles, and electrostatic or…
Modern ultra-intense laser facilities can generate electromagnetic fields strong enough to accelerate particles to near-light speeds over micron-scale distances and also approach the QED critical field, resulting in highly nonlinear and…
A customized finite-difference field solver for the particle-in-cell (PIC) algorithm that provides higher fidelity for wave-particle interactions in intense electromagnetic waves is presented. In many problems of interest, particles with…
High-intensity laser plasma interactions create complex computational problems because they involve both fluid and kinetic regimes, which need models that maintain physical precision while keeping computational speed. The research…
For many plasma physics problems, three-dimensional and kinetic effects are very important. However, such simulations are very computationally intensive. Fortunately, there is a class of problems for which there is nearly azimuthal symmetry…
There are many interesting physical processes which involve the generation of high density plasmas in large volumes. However, when modeling these systems numerically, the large densities and volumes present a significant computational…
Three-dimensional (3D) particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations are used to investigate the interaction of ultrahigh intensity lasers ($> 10^{20}$ W/cm$^{-2}$) with matter at overcritical densities. Intense laser pulses are shown to penetrate up…
A hybrid PIC-fluid model is proposed for three dimensional numerical simulation of laser-plasma interaction. Ions are treated kinetically, electrons as a ten-moment fluid, capturing ion-scale dynamics, pressure anisotropy, and…
Advances in ultra-intense laser technology are enabling, for the first time, relativistic intensities at mid-infrared (mid-IR) wavelengths. Anticipating further experimental research in this domain, we present high-resolution two…
We present hybrid PIC simulations of fast electron transport and energy deposition in pre-compressed fusion targets, taking full account of collective magnetic effects and the hydrodynamic response of the background plasma. Results on…
The development of ultra-intense laser-based sources of high energy ions is an important goal, with a variety of potential applications. One of the barriers to achieving this goal is the need to maximize the conversion efficiency from laser…
Particle-In-Cell (PIC) methods are frequently used for kinetic, high-fidelity simulations of plasmas. Implicit formulations of PIC algorithms feature strong conservation properties, up to numerical round-off errors, and are not subject to…
In the wake of the intense effort made for the experimental CILEX project, numerical simulation cam- paigns have been carried out in order to finalize the design of the facility and to identify optimal laser and plasma parameters. These…
Furthering our understanding of many of today's interesting problems in plasma physics---including plasma based acceleration and magnetic reconnection with pair production due to quantum electrodynamic effects---requires large-scale kinetic…
The implicit 2D3V particle-in-cell (PIC) code developed to study the interaction of ultrashort pulse lasers with matter [G. M. Petrov and J. Davis, Computer Phys. Comm. 179, 868 (2008); Phys. Plasmas 18, 073102 (2011)] has been parallelized…
Fast ignition is an alternative concept of laser fusion in which the task of compressing the fusion pellet to supersolid densities is accomplished by the conventional high energy nanosecond glass lasers and the task of igniting the…
Outstanding advances in solid-state laser technology, employing the optical parametric chirped-pulse-amplification (OPCPA) technique, have led physicists to focus laser pulses to highly-relativistic intensities which led to novel schemes…
Heating and ionization are among the most fundamental processes in relativistic laser--solid interactions; however, their spatiotemporal evolution remains challenging to capture experimentally. Here we present detailed diagnosis of…
In this dissertation, a fully object-oriented, fully relativistic, multi-dimensional Particle-In-Cell code was developed and applied to answer key questions in plasma-based accelerator research. The simulations increase the understanding of…