Related papers: Highly efficient conversion of laser energy to har…
Advances of high intensity lasers have opened up the field of strong field physics and led to a broad range of technological applications. Recent x ray laser sources and optics development makes it possible to obtain extremely high…
This dissertation explores the interaction between high-intensity lasers and plasmas to accelerate electrons and produce radiation via experimental and computational efforts. The laser pulses used in this dissertation have ultrashort…
From hot, tenuous gas dominated by Compton processes, to warm, photoionized emission-line regions, to cold, optically thick fluorescing matter, accreting gas flows in X-ray binaries span a huge portion of the parameter space accessible to…
We employ the $\lambda^3$ regime where a near-single-cycle laser pulse is tightly focused, thus providing the highest possible intensity for the minimal energy at a certain laser power. The quantum electrodynamics processes in the course of…
A detection technique for ultra-high energy cosmic rays, complementary to the fluorescence technique, would be the use of the molecular Bremsstrahlung radiation emitted by low-energy ionization electrons left after the passage of the…
Recent measurements of vertical extents and positions of the chromospheric hard X-ray (HXR) flare sources based on Ramaty High-Energy Spectroscopic Imager (RHESSI) observations show a significant inconsistency with the theoretical…
CO(J=1-0) line emission is a widely used observational tracer of molecular gas, rendering essential the X_CO factor, which is applied to convert CO luminosity to H_2 mass. We use numerical simulations to study how X_CO depends on numerical…
This paper describes the first experimental demonstration of the guiding of a relativistic electron beam in a solid target using two co-linear, relativistically intense, picosecond laser pulses. The first pulse creates a magnetic field…
The intensity and energy spatial distributions of collimated laser Compton scattering (LCS) $\gamma$-ray beams and of the associated bremsstrahlung beams have been investigated as functions of the electron beam energy, electron beam phase…
In low-mass X-ray binaries, the accretion of stellar material onto a neutron star can fuel unstable thermonuclear flashes known as Type I X-ray bursts. Simulating these events using computational models can provide valuable information…
A grid of composite models for the narrow line region of active galaxies, which consistently account for both the effect of a photoionizing radiation from the active center and of a shock front, is presented. Theoretical results, calculated…
Laser spectroscopic studies on minute samples of exotic radioactive nuclei require very efficient experimental techniques. In addition, high resolving powers are required to allow extraction of nu- clear structure information. Here we…
We show how bright, fully coherent, hard x-ray beams can be generated through nonlinear upconversion of femtosecond laser light. By using longer-wavelength mid-infrared driving lasers of moderate peak intensity, full phase matching of the…
Active longitudinal beam optics can help FEL facilities achieve cutting edge performance by optimizing the beam to: produce multi-color pulses, suppress caustics, or support attosecond lasing. As the next generation of superconducting…
Bright and ultrashort duration X-ray pulses can be produced by through betatron oscillations of electrons during Laser Wakefield Acceleration (LWFA). Our experimental measurements using the \textsc{Hercules} laser system demonstrate a…
We calculate the spectrum of blast wave models of gamma-ray burst sources, for various assumptions about the magnetic field density and the relativistic particle acceleration efficiency. For a range of physically plausible models we find…
Modelling the emission properties of compact high energy sources such as X-ray binaries, AGN or gamma-ray bursts represents a complex problem. Contributions of numerous processes participate non linearly to produce the observed spectra:…
Laser-electron beam collisions that aim to generate electron-positron pairs require laser intensities $I \gtrsim 10^{21} ~\textrm{W/cm}^2$, which can be obtained by focusing a 1-PW optical laser to a spot smaller than 10 $~\mu$m. Spatial…
Transition edge sensor microcalorimeters can measure x-ray and gamma-ray energies with very high energy resolution and high photon-collection efficiency. For this technology to reach its full potential in future x-ray observatories, each…
The results from 2.5-dimensional Particle-in-Cell simulations for the interaction of a picosecond-long ignition laser pulse with a plasma pellet of 50-$\mu m$ diameter and 40 critical density are presented. The high density pellet is…