Impact of compression grating phase modulations on beam over-intensities and downstream optics on PETAL facility

Abstract

Chirped pulse amplification has been widely implemented in high power laser chains. It consists of a set of diffraction gratings used to stretch and compress short laser pulses. In the case of high power laser chains, the compression stage is followed by the transport mirror in order to carry the laser beam to its final target. In such laser chains, laser beams propagate over a complex set of optical components and understanding the propagation of phase noise turns out to be of crucial importance. Phase modulation can induce laser damage on the final optical components. Here, we study the impact of phase modulation induced by the different diffraction gratings of the Petawatt Aquitaine Laser (PETAL) compressor on the downstream over-intensities, in particular on the transport mirror. This work allows us to quantify the impact of phase modulation for every single grating element in the compression stage, and to estimate the quantity of laser induced damage sites on transport optics for a specific laser shot.