Related papers: Surface plasmons in superintense laser-solid inter…
High-power lasers offer ultrahigh intensities for plasma interactions, but they lack advanced techniques to control the properties of the fields, because no optical elements could withstand their high intensities. The vibrant field of…
Surface acceleration of fast electrons in intense laser-plasma interaction is improved by using sub-wavelength grating targets. The fast electron beam emitted along the target surface was enhanced by more than three times relative to that…
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…
Generation of relativistic electron (RE) beams during ultraintense laser pulse interaction with plasma targets is studied by collisional particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations. Strong magnetic field with transverse scale length of several local…
Here we experimentally map the dynamics of electron plasma waves in laser solid interaction. We do time resolved measurements of second harmonic and hard X-ray generation from interaction of intense ($10^{16} W cm^{-2}$, 100 fs, 800nm)…
A high repetition rate electron source was generated by tightly focusing kHz, few-mJ laser pulses into an underdense plasma. This high intensity laser-plasma interaction led to stable electron beams over several hours but with strikingly…
In this paper the formation mechanisms of the femtosecond laser-induced periodic surface structures (LIPSS) are discussed. One of the most frequently-used theories explains the structures by interference between the incident laser beam and…
Magnetic field generation in ultra-intense laser-solid interactions is studied over a range of laser intensities relevant to next-generation laser facilities ($a_0 = 50-500$) using 2D particle-in-cell simulations. It is found that fields on…
Surface plasmon polaritons are electromagnetic waves propagating on the surface of a metal. Thanks to subwavelength confinement to the surface, they can concentrate optical energy on the micrometer or even nanometer scale, enabling new…
The plasma dynamics resulting from the simultaneous impact, of two equal, ultra-intense laser pulses, in two spatially separated spots, onto a dense target is studied via particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations. The simulations show that…
We investigate the nonlinear interaction between a relativistically strong laser beam and a plasma in the quantum regime. The collective behavior of the electrons is modeled by a Klein-Gordon equation, which is nonlinearly coupled with the…
Dense micron-sized electron plasmas, such as those generated upon irradiation of nanostructured metallic surfaces by intense femtosecond laser pulses, constitute a rich playground to study light-matter interactions, many-body phenomena, and…
Irradiation of solid surfaces with intense ultrashort laser pulses represents a unique way of depositing energy into materials. It allows to realize states of extreme electronic excitation and/or very high temperature and pressure, and to…
Plasma-based optics have emerged as a powerful platform for manipulating and amplifying ultra-intense laser pulses. However, the inherently nonlinear and dynamic nature of plasma leads to significant spatial, spectral, and temporal…
We demonstrate the potential of X-ray free-electron lasers (XFEL) to advancethe understanding of complex plasma dynamics by allowing for the first time nanometer and femtosecond resolution at the same time in plasma diagnostics. Plasma…
While plasma often behaves diamagnetically, we demonstrate that the laser irradiation of a thin opaque target with an embedded target-transverse seed magnetic field $B_\mathrm{seed}$ can trigger the generation of an order-of-magnitude…
Metals such as silver support surface plasmons: electromagnetic surface excitations localised near the surface which originate from the free electrons of the metal. Surface modes are also observed on highly conducting surfaces perforated by…
The dynamics of transient electric fields generated by the interaction of high intensity laser pulses with underdense plasmas has been studied experimentally with the proton projection imaging technique. The formation of a charged channel,…
We propose to use ultra-high intensity laser pulses with wavefront rotation (WFR) to produce short, ultra-intense surface plasma waves (SPW) on grating targets for electron acceleration. Combining a smart grating design with optimal WFR…
Nonlinear electron emission processes induced by surface plasmon oscillations have been studied both experimentally and theoretically. The measured above-threshold electron spectra extend up to energies whose appearance cannot be explained…