Laser Plasma Heavy Ion Source Using Thin-Foil Target with Micro Tips

Abstract

A target for a laser plasma ion source is improved by adding micro tips to a polytetrafluoroethylene thin foil that originally has a fibrous microstructure. C 6+ ions, deuterons, and protons are generated by irradiation of the target with laser pulses whose maximum intensity was 4.8×10 18 W/cm 2 . The additional micro-tip structure clearly increases the yields of deuterons and C 6+ ions, although that of the protons was not altered. The maximum energies of all the ion species are almost the same between the new and the conventional targets. They were ∼0.9, ∼1, and ∼6 MeV for the protons, deuterons, and C 6+ ions, respectively.