Related papers: Optimizing Laser-Plasma Interactions for Ion Accel…
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…
The emission of multi-MeV ($\gamma$-ray) photons from the interaction of a high-powered laser pulse with a dense plasma target is studied using particle-in-cell simulations. A new set of diagnostic techniques is presented and applied to…
We use Bayesian optimization in combination with three-dimensional particle-in-cell simulations to determine the optimal laser and plasma parameters that, for a given laser pulse energy, maximize the cut-off energy of an electron beam…
Longitudinal ion acceleration from high-intensity (I ~ 10^20 Wcm^-2) laser interactions with helium gas jet targets (n_e ~ 0.04 n_c) have been observed. The ion beam has a maximum energy for He^2+ of approximately 40 MeV and was directional…
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…
An overview of research on laser-plasma based acceleration of ions is given. The experimental state of the art is summarized and recent progress is discussed. The basic acceleration processes are briefly reviewed with an outlook on hybrid…
Ultra intense lasers are a promising source of energetic ions for various applications. An interesting approach described in Ferri et al. 2019 argues from Particle-in-Cell simulations that using two laser pulses of half energy (half…
Direct Laser Acceleration (DLA) of electrons during a high-energy, picosecond laser interaction with an underdense plasma has been demonstrated to be substantially enhanced by controlling the laser focusing geometry. Experiments using the…
Experiments on ion acceleration by irradiation of ultra-thin diamond-like carbon (DLC) foils, with thicknesses well below the skin depth, irradiated with laser pulses of ultra-high contrast and linear polarization, are presented. A maximum…
The propagation of intense laser pulses and the generation of high energy electrons from the underdense plasmas are investigated using two dimensional particle-in-cell simulations. When the ratio of the laser power and a critical power of…
We present the process of ion acceleration using ultra-thin foils irradiated by elliptically polarized, high-intensity laser pulses. Recently, efficient generation of monoenergetic ion beams was introduced using the concept of laser-ion…
Understanding the target dynamics during its interaction with a relativistic ultrashort laser pulse is a challenging fundamental multi-physics problem involving at least atomic and solid-state physics, plasma physics, and laser physics.…
We use particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations and simple analytic models to investigate the laser-plasma interaction known as ponderomotive steepening. When normally incident laser light reflects at the critical surface of a plasma, the…
A method for the optimisation and advanced studies of a laser-plasma electron injector is presented, based on a truncated ionisation injection scheme for high quality beam production. The SMILEI code is used with laser envelope…
The interaction of ultrashort, high intensity laser pulses with thin foil targets leads to ion acceleration on the target rear surface. To make this ion source useful for applications, it is important to optimize the transfer of energy from…
Direct laser acceleration has proven to be an efficient source of high-charge electron bunches and high brilliance X-rays. However, an analytical description of the acceleration in the interaction with varying plasma density targets is…
We present a parametric study based on 1-D particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations conducted with the objective of understanding the interaction of intense lasers with near-critical non-uniform density gas targets. Specifically, we aim to find…
Although the interaction of a flat-foil with currently available laser intensities is now considered a routine process, during the last decade emphasis is given to targets with complex geometries aiming on increasing the ion energy. This…
The resources needed for Particle in Cell simulations of Laser Wakefield Acceleration can be greatly reduced in many cases of interest using an envelope model. However, the inclusion of tunneling ionization in this time averaged treatment…
How fast can a laser pulse ionize an atom? We address this question by considering pulses that carry a fixed time-integrated energy per-area, and finding those that achieve the double requirement of maximizing the ionization that they…