Ion Acceleration in a Dipole Vortex in a Laser Plasma Corona

Abstract

Particle-in-cell simulations show that the inhomogeneity scale of the plasma produced in the interaction of high-power laser radiation with gas targets is of fundamental importance for ion acceleration. In a plasma slab with sharp boundaries, the quasistatic magnetic field and the associated electron vortex structure produced by fast electron beams both expand along the slab boundary in a direction perpendicular to the plasma density gradient, forming an extended region with a quasistatic electric field, in which the ions are accelerated. In a plasma with a smooth density distribution, the dipole magnetic field can propagate toward the lower plasma density in the propagation direction of the laser pulse. In this case, the electron density in an electric current filament at the axis of the magnetic dipole decreases to values at which the charge quasineutrality condition fails to hold. In electric fields generated by this process, the ions are accelerated to energies substantially higher than those characteristic of plasma configurations with sharp boundaries.