<title>Demonstration of a neon-like argon x-ray laser using a short-pulse laser-irradiated gas puff target</title>

Abstract

In this work we demonstrate a soft x-ray laser with neon- like argon ions using a gas puff target irradiated with a combination of long 600 ps and short 6 ps high-power laser pulses with a total of 10 J energy. The gas puff target was formed by pulsed injection of gas from a high-pressure solenoid valve through a nozzle in the form of a narrow slit. The target was irradiated in a traveling-wave excitation geometry. Lasing was observed on the 3p <SUP>1</SUP>S<SUB>0</SUB> implies 3s <SUP>1</SUP>P<SUB>1</SUB> transition at 46.9 nm and the 3d <SUP>1</SUP>P<SUB>1</SUB> implies 3p <SUP>1</SUP>P<SUB>1</SUB> transition at 45.1 nm. Gain of 11 cm<SUP>-1</SUP> was measured on these transitions for targets up to 0.9 cm long.