Related papers: Surface Plasmon-Driven Electron and Proton Acceler…
Ion acceleration due to the interaction between a short high-intensity laser pulse and a moderately overdense plasma target is studied using Eulerian Vlasov-Maxwell simulations. The effects of variations in the plasma density profile and…
We show that under appropriate conditions the impact of a very short and intense laser pulse onto a plasma causes the expulsion of surface electrons with high energy in the direction opposite to the one of propagation of the pulse. This is…
A concept for the efficient generation of surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) with a duration of very few cycles is presented. The scheme is based on grating coupling and laser pulses with wavefront rotation (WFR), so that the resonance…
The rapid progress that plasma wakefield accelerators are experiencing is now posing the question as to whether they could be included in the design of the next generation of high-energy electron-positron colliders. However, the typical…
Proton acceleration by high-intensity laser pulses from ultra-thin foils for hadron therapy is discussed. With the improvement of the laser intensity contrast ratio to 10-11 achieved on Hercules laser at the University of Michigan, it…
Using a kilojoule class laser, we demonstrate for the first time that high-contrast picosecond pulses are advantageous for ion acceleration. We show that a laser pulse with optimum duration and a large focal spot accelerates electrons…
A short overview of laser-plasma acceleration of ions is presented. The focus is on some recent experimental results and related theoretical work on advanced regimes. These latter include in particular target normal sheath acceleration…
High-energy, high-flux collimated proton beams with high repetition rates are critical for applications such as proton therapy, proton radiography, high-energy-density matter generation, and compact particle accelerators. However, achieving…
Inelastic electron tunneling provides a low-energy pathway for the excitation of surface plasmons and light emission. We theoretically investigate tunnel junctions based on metals and graphene. We show that graphene is potentially a highly…
We have detected the presence of very high intensity surface waves that are excited during plasma waveguided laser wakefield acceleration. Wakefield acceleration can be enchanced by the introduction of an ``all optical" plasma waveguide…
Launching of surface plasmons by swift electrons has long been utilized in electron-energy-loss spectroscopy (EELS) to investigate plasmonic properties of ultrathin, or two-dimensional (2D), electron systems. However, its spatio-temporal…
We have investigated proton acceleration in the forward direction from a near-critical density hydrogen gas jet target irradiated by a high intensity (10^18 W/cm^2), short-pulse (5 ps) laser with wavelength of 1.054 micron. We observe the…
Direct laser acceleration of electrons is considered in a strongly magnetized plasmoid with the magnetic field strength allowing for reaching the auto-resonance. The plasmoid may be optically created by irradiation of specially designed…
Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is enabled by local surface plasmon resonances (LSPRs) in metallic nanogaps. When SERS is excited by direct illumination of the nanogap, the background heating of lattice and electrons can prevent…
Ion acceleration driven by superintense laser pulses is attracting an impressive and steadily increasing effort. Motivations can be found in the potential for a number of foreseen applications and in the perspective to investigate novel…
We propose a scheme to overcome the great challenge of polarization loss in spin-polarized ion acceleration. When a petawatt laser pulse penetrates through a compound plasma target consisting of a double layer slab and prepolarized hydrogen…
Surface Plasmon Polaritons (SPP) are exploited due to their intriguing properties for photonic circuits fabrication and miniaturization, for surface enhanced spectroscopies and imaging beyond the diffraction limit. However, the excitation…
Collisionless shock acceleration of protons and C$^{6+}$ ions has been achieved by the interaction of a 10$^{20}$ W/cm$^2$, 1 $\mu$m laser with a near-critical density plasma. Ablation of the initially solid density target by a secondary…
A free electron can temporarily gain a very significant amount of energy if it is overrun by an intense electromagnetic wave. In principle, this process would permit large enhancements in the center-of-mass energy of electron-electron,…
Using fully three-dimensional particle-in-cell simulations, we show that readily available femtosecond laser systems can stably generate proton beams with hundred MeV energy and low spread at $\sim1\%$ level by parallel irradiation of a…