Two-stage laser acceleration of high quality protons using a tailored density plasma

Journal Article · Tue Feb 05 00:00:00 EST 2019 · Physical Review Accelerators and Beams

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevAccelBeams.22.021301· OSTI ID:1493510

Wan, Y.; Andriyash, I. A.; Hua, J. F.; Pai, C. -H.; Lu, W.; Mori, W. B.; Joshi, C.; Malka, V.

A new scheme for a laser-driven proton accelerator based on a sharply tailored near-critical-density plasma target is proposed. The designed plasma profile allows for the laser channeling of the dense plasma, which triggers a two-stage acceleration of protons—first accelerated by the laser acting as a snowplow in plasma, and then by the collisionless shock launched from the sharp density downramp. Thanks to laser channeling in the near-critical plasma, the formed shock is radially small and collimated. This allows it to generate a significant space-charge field, which acts as a monochromator, defocusing the lower energy protons while the highest ones remain collimated. Our theoretical and numerical analysis demonstrates production of high-energy proton beams with few tens of percent energy spread, few degrees divergence angle and charge up to few nC. With a PW-class ultrashort laser this scheme predicts the generation of such high quality proton beams with energies up to several hundreds of MeV.

• Research Organization: Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE
• Grant/Contract Number: NA0003842
• OSTI ID: 1493510
• Alternate ID(s): OSTI ID: 1544122
• Journal Information: Physical Review Accelerators and Beams, Journal Name: Physical Review Accelerators and Beams Vol. 22 Journal Issue: 2; ISSN 2469-9888
• Publisher: American Physical Society
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

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