Laser-plasma Interaction Process Research Articles

Near forward scattering light of planar film target driven by broadband laser

Laser plasma interaction (LPI) has always been an important research topic in the ignition phase of inertial confinement fusion (ICF). Over the years, researchers have attempted to use various laser beam smoothing schemes and optimized light source solutions to suppress the development of LPI. Among them, low-coherence laser drivers have attracted widespread attention in the fields of laser-plasma physics and laser technology in recent years. Recently, a broadband second harmonic laser facility named “Kunwu” has provided a reliable experimental research platform for the LPI process driven by broadband lasers. Aiming at the strong stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) and stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) in the LPI process of large-scale low-density plasma, forward scattering experiment and near-forward scattering experiment on C<sub>8</sub>H<sub>8</sub> planar film targets driven by broadband laser and narrowband laser under the same conditions are carried out. Based on the “Kunwu” laser facility, two sets of measurement systems are designed, one is centered around fiber-heads and spectrometer, and the other around phototubes and oscilloscope. These systems enable multi-directional precise measurements of scattered lightand a comprehensive analysis of LPI. The main focus is on the comparison of the components and spectral information of the scattering beams between broadband laser and narrowband laser, and it is found that the LPI processes driven by broadband laser and narrowband laser are greatly different. Additionally, preliminary results indicate that broadband laser exhibits a stronger penetration capability than narrowband laser. The time to ablation the target and penetrate the plasma are both nearly 1 ns ahead, with the transmitted energy increased by nearly an order of magnitude. And after penetrating the plasma, there is a smaller spatial divergence angle. These results provide good reference value for better understanding the effect of broadband laser on LPI.

Spectral structures of backward stimulated Brillouin scattering driven by a picosecond laser

Laser plasma interaction (LPI) is an important content in laser plasma related research, and it is one of the key issues related to the success or failure of inertial confinement fusion ignition, and has received extensive attention. In order to suppress the relevant LPI process as much as possible, the major laboratories around the world have developed a variety of beam smoothing methods through decades of research. However, the current understanding and suppression of LPI are still far from enough, and further in-depth studies are still needed. Generally, the research of LPI is based on nanosecond laser driving, and focuses mainly on the effects of the related LPI process caused by nanosecond lasers. However, the LPI processes, such as stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS), stimulated Raman scattering (SRS), etc., occur and develop on a time scale of picoseconds.The comprehensive effect can be studied only on a longer scale of nanosecond. For highly nonlinear LPI processes, the comprehensive effect may be difficult to reflect the real physical laws. The emergence of the picosecond laser has made it possible to study the LPI process in more detail and on a more appropriate time scale. The present research tries to gain an understanding of LPI from a more refined perspective. The experimental research of picosecond laser driving LPI is carried out on the Shenguang-Ⅱ upgrade and picosecond laser facilities. First, a nanosecond laser is used to irradiate a target to generate a large-scale plasma, and a few nanoseconds later, the picosecond laser is injected as an interaction beam to drive the LPI scattering such as SBS and SRS. The spectral signal of backscatter light is measured experimentally by using the method of diffuse reflector. From the research results it is found that the backward signals of the band near the laser wavelength contain, in addition to the true backward SBS component, a large number of interference signals introduced by picosecond laser and nanosecond laser. The interference signal introduced by nanosecond laser can be eliminated by using specific measures, but the interference signal introduced by picosecond laser cannot be eliminated experimentally, which will affect the estimation of the true share of the backward SBS. The comprehensive results show that under different experimental conditions, the backward scatter energy of SBS may be less than half that of the total recorded signals. This result is helpful in further understanding and re-recognizing previous relevant experimental data.

Research progress of high-order harmonics and attosecond radiation driven by interaction between intense lasers and plasma

The realizing of the detection and control of ultrafast process conduces to understanding and remoulding the physical world at a microcosm level. The attosecond light source with attosecond temporal resolution and nanometer spatial resolution can realize real-time detection and manipulation of the atomic-scale electronic dynamics and relevant effects of the substances. Therefore, attosecond science is considered as one of the most important milestones in the history of laser science. and has been listed as an important scientific and technological development direction in the coming 10 years. High-order harmonic generation (HHG) from intense laser-matter interaction is one of the most important routes to breaking through the femtosecond limit and achieving brilliant attosecond pulse radiations, and thus having aroused great interest in recent years. After more than 20-year development, the research about attosecond pulse generation by laser-gas interaction has reached a mature stage. This method produces the shortest isolated pulse in the world to date, with a pulse width being only 43 as. However, this method based on ionization-acceleration-combination encounters inevitable difficulties in pursuing the relativistically intense attosecond pulses and the highest possible photon energy. Quite a lot of studies have proved that the HHG efficiency from laser-plasma interaction can be a few orders of magnitude higher than that in gaseous media, which makes it possible to produce pulses with shorter pulse width and higher photon energy. In this article, we introduce the main generation mechanisms, research progress and frontier applications of HHG through the laser-plasma interaction process. In Section 2, we introduce the HHG generation mechanisms, including coherent wake emission, which is used to describe the HHG process driven by a nonrelativistic laser; relativistic oscillating mirror, which can well explain most of HHG processes generated from plasma-vacuum interface in relativistic regime; coherent synchrotron emission, which is suited to explain the HHG synchronously emitted from isolated electron sheets. The research progress is summarized in Section 3 from the aspects of radiation efficiency, polarization characteristics, phase characteristics, generation and diagnosis of isolated attosecond pulses, etc. Frontier applications of these ultra-broadband intense attosecond pulses are presented in the last section, such as the study of electronic dynamics, process, coherent diffraction imaging, diagnosis of extreme states of matter, the generation of extremely intense fields, etc. Finally, an outlook on the future development trends and innovation breakthroughs is also presented.

Laser pulse dispersion in underdense plasma and associated ion acceleration by relativistic self-induced transparency

The propagation of laser pulses in the underdense plasma is a very crucial aspect of the laser-plasma interaction process. In this work, we explored the two regimes of laser propagation in the plasma, one with a0 < 1 and the other with a0≳10. For the a0 < 1 case, we used a cold relativistic fluid model, wherein apart from immobile ions no further approximations are made. The effects of laser pulse amplitude, pulse duration, and plasma density are studied using the fluid model and compared with the expected scaling laws and also with the particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations. The agreement between the fluid model and the PIC simulations are found to be excellent. Furthermore, for the a0≳10 case, we used the PIC simulations alone. The delicate interplay between the conversion from the electromagnetic field energy to the longitudinal electrostatic fields results in dispersion, and so the redshift of the pump laser pulse. The dispersed pulse is then allowed to be incident on the subwavelength two-layer composite target. The underdense plasma before the target regulates the dispersion of the pulse. We observed an optimum pretarget plasma density which results in the acceleration of the ions from the secondary layer to ∼170 MeV by a ∼8 fs linearly polarized Gaussian laser pulse with ∼8.5 × 1020 W/cm2.

Electron self-injection and acceleration in a hollow plasma channel driven by ultrashort intense laser pulses**Project supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 11147005, 61665006, and 61865011) and the Natural Science Foundation of Jiangxi Province of China (Grant Nos. 20151BAB202018, 20161BAB212041, and 20162BCB23012).

The self-injection and acceleration of electrons in a hollow plasma channel driven by ultrashort intense laser pulses is investigated by Particle-in-Cell (PIC) simulations. It is shown that electrons from the bubble sheath will be self-injected into the hollow plasma channel and move radially towards the channel border due to the lack of focusing force in the hollow plasma channel. After several reflections near the channel wall by the strong focusing force, a self-injected electron bunch can be confined in the hollow plasma channel and quasi-phase-stably accelerated forward for the whole laser–plasma interaction process. These electrons using optical and plasma-related self-injection method can be self-organized to remain in the rear of the bubble, where the accelerating electric field is transversely uniform and nearly plateau along the propagation axis. Therefore, the self-injected electron bunch can be accelerated in a steady state without obvious oscillation and has a high quality with narrow energy spread and low divergence.

Efficiency control of high-order harmonic generation in gases using driving pulse spectral features

The low conversion efficiency of high-order harmonic generation (HHG) in gases is an insurmountable limitation for many applications, where a considerable photon flux is an instrumental prerequisite. We present a study of the HHG conversion efficiency dependence on the driving laser intensity and analyze the conditions for optimal phase-matching in a loose focusing configuration and long generation medium using a Ti:Sapphire laser. Moreover, by determination of the influence of plasma effects on the driving laser pulse, we observe a correlation between the HHG conversion efficiency and the blueshift of the fundamental pulse. The maximal HHG conversion efficiency is achieved just before the driving laser spectrum is considerably affected by the plasma. Similar behavior is observed in HHG for different noble gases. In this respect, the appearance of a plasma-induced spectral shift in the driving laser might serve as an indication of a substantial loss of HHG conversion efficiency. Consequently, our findings can be exploited to obtain essential information about the laser-plasma interaction process during HHG and can pave the way for a more convenient control of optimal HHG conditions.

A new approach to theoretical investigations of high harmonics generation by means of fs laser interaction with overdense plasma layers. Combining particle-in-cell simulations with machine learning.

Within the past decade, various experimental and theoretical investigations have been performed in the field of high-order harmonics generation (HHG) by means of femtosecond (fs) laser pulses interacting with laser produced plasmas. Numerous potential future applications thus arise. Beyond achieving higher conversion efficiency for higher harmonic orders and hence harmonic power and brilliance, there are more ambitious scientific goals such as attaining shorter harmonic wavelengths or reducing harmonic pulse durations towards the attosecond and even the zeptosecond range. High order harmonics are also an attractive diagnostic tool for the laser-plasma interaction process itself. Particle-in-Cell (PIC) simulations are known to be one of the most important numerical instruments employed in plasma physics and in laser-plasma interaction investigations. The novelty brought by this paper consists in combining the PIC method with several machine learning approaches. For predictive modelling purposes, a universal functional approximator is used, namely a multi-layer perceptron (MLP), in conjunction with a self-organizing map (SOM). The training sets have been retrieved from the PIC simulations and also from the available literature in the field. The results demonstrate the potential utility of machine learning in predicting optimal interaction scenarios for gaining higher order harmonics or harmonics with particular features such as a particular wavelength range, a particular harmonic pulse duration or a certain intensity. Furthermore, the author will show how machine learning can be used for estimations of electronic temperatures, proving that it can be a reliable tool for obtaining better insights into the fs laser interaction physics.

Note: Real-time monitoring via second-harmonic interferometry of a flow gas cell for laser wakefield acceleration.

The use of a gas cell as a target for laser wakefield acceleration (LWFA) offers the possibility to obtain stable and manageable laser-plasma interaction process, a mandatory condition for practical applications of this emerging technique, especially in multi-stage accelerators. In order to obtain full control of the gas particle number density in the interaction region, thus allowing for a long term stable and manageable LWFA, real-time monitoring is necessary. In fact, the ideal gas law cannot be used to estimate the particle density inside the flow cell based on the preset backing pressure and the room temperature because the gas flow depends on several factors like tubing, regulators, and valves in the gas supply system, as well as vacuum chamber volume and vacuum pump speed/throughput. Here, second-harmonic interferometry is applied to measure the particle number density inside a flow gas cell designed for LWFA. The results demonstrate that real-time monitoring is achieved and that using low backing pressure gas (<1 bar) and different cell orifice diameters (<2 mm) it is possible to finely tune the number density up to the 10(19) cm(-3) range well suited for LWFA.

A coordinate transformation method for calculating the 3D light intensity distribution in ICF hohlraum

For an inertial confinement fusion (ICF) system, the light intensity distribution in the hohlraum is key to the initial plasma excitation and later laser-plasma interaction process. Based on the concept of coordinate transformation of spatial points and vector, we present a robust method with a detailed procedure that makes the calculation of the three dimensional (3D) light intensity distribution in hohlraum easily. The method is intuitive but powerful enough to solve the complex cases of random number of laser beams with arbitrary polarization states and incidence angles. Its application is exemplified in the Shenguang III Facility (SG-III) that verifies its effectiveness and it is useful for guiding the design of hohlraum structure parameter.

Coupled hydrodynamic model for laser-plasma interaction and hot electron generation

We present a formulation of the model of laser-plasma interaction (LPI) at hydrodynamical scales that couples the plasma dynamics with linear and nonlinear LPI processes, including the creation and propagation of high-energy electrons excited by parametric instabilities and collective effects. This formulation accounts for laser beam refraction and diffraction, energy absorption due to collisional and resonant processes, and hot electron generation due to the stimulated Raman scattering, two-plasmon decay, and resonant absorption processes. Hot electron (HE) transport and absorption are described within the multigroup angular scattering approximation, adapted for transversally Gaussian electron beams. This multiscale inline LPI-HE model is used to interpret several shock ignition experiments, highlighting the importance of target preheating by HEs and the shortcomings of standard geometrical optics when modeling the propagation and absorption of intense laser pulses. It is found that HEs from parametric instabilities significantly increase the shock pressure and velocity in the target, while decreasing its strength and the overall ablation pressure.

The development of laser-plasma interaction program LAP3D on thousands of processors

Modeling laser-plasma interaction (LPI) processes in real-size experiments scale is recognized as a challenging task. For explorering the influence of various instabilities in LPI processes, a three-dimensional laser and plasma code (LAP3D) has been developed, which includes filamentation, stimulated Brillouin backscattering (SBS), stimulated Raman backscattering (SRS), non-local heat transport and plasmas flow computation modules. In this program, a second-order upwind scheme is applied to solve the plasma equations which are represented by an Euler fluid model. Operator splitting method is used for solving the equations of the light wave propagation, where the Fast Fourier translation (FFT) is applied to compute the diffraction operator and the coordinate translations is used to solve the acoustic wave equation. The coupled terms of the different physics processes are computed by the second-order interpolations algorithm. In order to simulate the LPI processes in massively parallel computers well, several parallel techniques are used, such as the coupled parallel algorithm of FFT and fluid numerical computation, the load balance algorithm, and the data transfer algorithm. Now the phenomena of filamentation, SBS and SRS have been studied in low-density plasma successfully with LAP3D. Scalability of the program is demonstrated with a parallel efficiency above 50% on about ten thousand of processors.

Relativistic Propagation of Linearly/Circularly Polarized Laser Radiation in Plasmas

Paraxial theory of relativistic self-focusing of Gaussian laser beams in plasmas for arbitrary magnitude of intensity of the beam has been presented in this paper. The nonlinearity in the dielectric constant arises on account of relativistic variation of mass. An appropriate expression for the nonlinear dielectric constant has been used to study laser beam propagation for linearly/circularly polarized wave. The variation of beamwidth parameter with distance of propagation, self-trapping condition, and critical power has been evaluated. The saturating nature of nonlinearity yields two values of critical power of the beam ( and ) for self-focusing. When the beam diverges. When the beam first converges then diverges and so on. When the beam first diverges and then converges and so on. Numerical estimates are made for linearly/circularly polarized wave applicable for typical values of relativistic laser-plasma interaction process in underdense and overdense plasmas. Since the relativistic mechanism is instantaneous, this theory is applicable to understanding of self-focusing of laser pulses.

Effects of laser-plasma interactions on terahertz radiation from solid targets irradiated by ultrashort intense laser pulses

Interactions of 100-fs laser pulses with solid targets at intensities of 10(18) W/cm(2) and resultant terahertz (THz) radiation are studied under different laser contrast ratio conditions. THz emission is measured in the specular reflection direction, which appears to decrease as the laser contrast ratio varies from 10(-8) to 10(-6). Correspondingly, the frequency spectra of the reflected light are observed changing from second harmonic dominant, three-halves harmonic dominant, to vanishing of both harmonics. Two-dimensional particle-in-cell simulation also suggests that this observation is correlated with the plasma density scale length change. The results demonstrate that the THz emission is closely related to the laser-plasma interaction processes. The emission is strong when resonance absorption is a key feature of the interaction, and becomes much weaker when parametric instabilities dominate.

Nonlinear propagation of intense electromagnetic beams with plasma density ramp functions

The relativistic oscillation of the mass of the electrons and also the relativistic electron ponderomotive force are shown to have a effect on the nonlinear propagation of intense electromagnetic waves. Based on WKB and paraxial ray theory, the steady state nonlinear refraction of relativistically intense, circularly polarized, Gaussian electromagnetic beams in an inhomogeneous plasma is studied. The nature of propagation of the beam depends on the power, width of the beam and 'Ω', the ratio of plasma and wave-frequency. It can be concluded from the calculations that electromagnetic waves can propagate in different regimes. The regions are steady divergence, oscillatory divergence and self-focusing. Numerical estimates are made for typical values of relativistic laser-plasma interaction process with electron density varying between 1017 -1020 particles per cm 3 and radiation intensities in the range 1016 -1020 W/cm 2 for different plasma density ramp functions.

Effect of self-generated axial magnetic field and on propagation of intense laser radiation in plasmas

The present paper deals with an analytical study of a self-generated axial magnetic field (SGAMF) through the inverse Faraday effect (IFE) and its influence on the propagation of circularly polarized light wave for relativistic intensities. As a first step, the non-linear dielectric constant incorporating a magnetic field in the relativistic factor within the framework of WKB (for Wentzel, Kramers, and Brillouin) and a paraxial ray theory is formulated. It is noticed that for intensities (>1018 W cm−2), circularly polarized radiation can propagate in electron plasma whose density is greater than the critical density as well as a strong flow of relativistic electrons, axially co-moving with the pulse rise. The above generates a magnetic field up to 100 MG and strongly influences the light propagation. Two modes of propagation exist, namely, extraordinary and ordinary, and critical power for focusing is different for the two modes. The non-linear dielectric tensor, propagation equation, and the self-trapped radius are evaluated incorporating an induced magnetic field. The focusing conditions strongly depend on the power of the beam, strength of the magnetic field as well as on the density of the medium. Numerical calculations are made for a typical set of relativistic laser plasma interaction processes.

Saturation of stimulated Raman scattering in laser-plasma interaction

The saturation of stimulated Raman scattering （SRS） through Langmuir decay instability （LDI） and electron trapping in laser-plasma interaction process is studied. Analytical expressions for the saturation time of SRS are obtained for both the LDI and electron trapping schemes in 1-D homogeneous plasma irradiated by unrelativistic laser beams. The simple analytical model agrees well with numerical simulation and experiment in respect of the dependence of the saturation time of SRS on the parameters of lasers and plasmas.

Energetics of multiple-ion species hohlraum plasmas

A study of the laser-plasma interaction processes has been performed in multiple-ion species hohlraum plasmas at conditions similar to those expected in indirect drive inertial confinement fusion targets. Gas-filled hohlraums with electron densities of 5.5×1020 and 9×1020cm−3 are heated by 14.3kJ of laser energy (wavelength 351nm) to electron temperatures of 3keV and backscattered laser light is measured. Landau damping of the ion acoustic waves is increased by adding hydrogen to a CO2 or CF4 gas. Stimulated Brillouin backscattering of a 351nm probe beam is found to decrease monotonically with increasing Landau damping, accompanied by a comparable increase in the transmission. More efficient energy coupling into the hohlraum by suppression of backscatter from the heater beams results in an increased hohlraum radiation temperature, showing that multiple-ion species plasmas improve the overall hohlraum energetics. The reduction in backscatter is reproduced by linear gain calculations as well as detailed full-scale three-dimensional laser-plasma interaction simulations, demonstrating that Landau damping is the controlling damping mechanism in inertial confinement fusion relevant high-electron temperature plasmas. These findings have led to the inclusion of multiple-ion species plasmas in the hohlraum point design for upcoming ignition campaigns at the National Ignition Facility.

Laser beam propagation through inertial confinement fusion hohlraum plasmas

A study of the laser-plasma interaction processes have been performed in plasmas that are created to emulate the plasma conditions in indirect drive inertial confinement fusion targets. The plasma emulator is produced in a gas-filled hohlraum; a blue 351-nm laser beam propagates along the axis of the hohlraum interacting with a high-temperature (Te=3.5keV), dense (ne=5×1020cm−3), long-scale length (L∼2mm) plasma. Experiments at these conditions have demonstrated that the interaction beam produces less than 1% total backscatter resulting in transmission greater than 90% for laser intensities less than I&amp;lt;2×1015Wcm−2. The bulk plasma conditions have been independently characterized using Thomson scattering where the peak electron temperatures are shown to scale with the hohlraum heater beam energy in the range from 2keV to 3.5keV. This feature has allowed us to determine the thresholds for both backscattering and filamentation instabilities; the former measured with absolutely calibrated full aperture backscatter and near backscatter diagnostics and the latter with a transmitted beam diagnostics. Comparing the experimental results with detailed gain calculations for the onset of significant laser scattering processes shows a stimulated Brillouin scattering threshold (R=10%) for a linear gain of 15; these high temperature, low density experiments produce plasma conditions comparable to those along the outer beams in ignition hohlraum designs. By increasing the gas fill density (ne=1021cm−3) in these targets, the inner beam ignition hohlraum conditions are accessed. In this case, stimulated Raman scattering dominates the backscattering processes and we show that scattering is small for gains less than 20 which can be achieved through proper choice of the laser beam intensity.

Debye sheath of laser produced plasmas generalized to the quark-gluon plasmas and high energy density physics

Generation of very intense proton beams at relativistic interaction of ps-PW laser pulses at the rare side of irradiated foils were explained by a PIC computation as a target normal sheath acceleration mechanism (TNSA) [1]. This is a typical process in an electric double layer of a Debye sheath in contrast to the sub-relativistic nonlinear forces for the skin layer acceleration (SLA) at plane target geometry based on very high contrast ratio to avoid relativistic self-focusing. We discuss the Debye layer process as known from laser generated plasma and how these properties are essential for the laser-plasma interaction process, e.g. under the relativistic conditions for the TNSA process, while the subrelativistic plasma blocks for ignition of condensed or higher density deuterium-tritium have a sufficiently low Debye length. From these results, a basically new concept of nuclear forces and consequences about quark-gluon plasma can be derived by generalizing the Debye layer property for the confinement of the hadrons in a nucleus.

On the control of filamentation of intense laser beams propagating in underdense plasma

In indirect drive inertial confinement fusion ignition designs, the laser energy is delivered into the hohlraum through the laser entrance holes (LEHs), which are sized as small as practicable to minimize x-ray radiation losses. On the other hand, deleterious laser plasma processes, such as filamentation and stimulated backscatter, typically increase with laser intensity. Ideally, therefore, the laser spot shape should be a close fit to the LEH, with uniform (envelope) intensity in the spot and minimal energy at larger radii spilling onto the LEH material. This keeps the laser intensity as low as possible, consistent with the area of the LEH aperture and the power requirements of the design. This can be achieved (at least for apertures significantly larger than the laser’s aberrated focal spot) by the use of custom-designed phase plates. However, outfitting the 192–beam National Ignition Facility [J. A. Paisner, E. M. Campbell, and W. J. Hogan, Fusion Tech. 26, 755 1994)] laser with multiple sets of phase plates optimized for a variety of different LEH aperture sizes is an expensive proposition. It is thus important to assess the impact on laser-plasma interaction processes of using phase plates with a smaller than optimum focal spot (or even no phase plates at all!) and then defocusing the beam to expand it to fill the LEH and lower its intensity. Significant effects are found from changes in the characteristic sizes of the laser speckle, from the lack of uniformity of the laser envelope out of the focal plane and on the efficacy of additional polarization smoothing and/or smoothing by spectral dispersion (SSD). These effects are quantified with analytic estimates and simulations using PF3D, our laser-plasma interaction code.