Acceleration of heavy multicharged ions up to 1 MeV from a cleaned solid target irradiated by a femtosecond laser pulse with an intensity of 1016 W/cm2

Abstract

A noticeable increase in the charge and energy of ions accelerated from a solid tungsten target irradiated by a femtosecond laser pulse with an intensity higher than 1016W/cm2 has been found when the target surface is precleaned by a nanosecond laser pulse with an energy density of 3 J/cm2. Tungsten ions with charges up to +29 and energies up to 1 MeV were detected in this case, while the charge and energy of tungsten ions from a target with an uncleaned surface do not exceed +3 and 12 keV, respectively.