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Title: First demonstration of ARC-accelerated proton beams at the National Ignition Facility

Journal Article · · Physics of Plasmas
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5085787· OSTI ID:1545360
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  1. Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
  2. Univ. of California at San Diego, La Jolla, CA (United States)
  3. General Atomics, La Jolla, CA (United States)
  4. Univ. of Oxford, Oxford (United Kingdom)
  5. Osaka Univ., Osaka (Japan)
  6. STFC Rutherford Appleton Lab, Didcot (United Kingdom)
  7. Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
+ Show Author Affiliations

New short-pulse kilojoule, Petawatt-class lasers, which have recently come online and are coupled to large-scale, many-beam long-pulse facilities, undoubtedly serve as very exciting tools to capture transformational science opportunities in high energy density physics. These short-pulse lasers also happen to reside in a unique laser regime: very high-energy (kilojoule), relatively long (multi-picosecond) pulse-lengths, and large (10s of micron) focal spots, where their use in driving energetic particle beams is largely unexplored. Proton acceleration via Target Normal Sheath Acceleration (TNSA) using the Advanced Radiographic Capability (ARC) short-pulse laser at the National Ignition Facility in the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is demonstrated for the first time, and protons of up to 18 MeV are measured using laser irradiation of >1 ps pulse-lengths and quasi-relativistic (1018 W/cm2) intensities. This is indicative of a super-ponderomotive electron acceleration mechanism that sustains acceleration over long (multi-picosecond) time-scales and allows for proton energies to be achieved far beyond what the well-established scalings of proton acceleration via TNSA would predict at these modest intensities. Furthermore, the characteristics of the ARC laser (large ~100 μm diameter focal spot, flat spatial profile, multi-picosecond, relatively low prepulse) provide acceleration conditions that allow for the investigation of 1D-like particle acceleration. A high flux ~50 J of laser-accelerated protons is experimentally demonstrated. In conclusion, a new capability in multi-picosecond particle-in-cell simulation is applied to model the data, corroborating the high proton energies and elucidating the physics of multi-picosecond particle acceleration.

Research Organization:
Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC52-07NA27344; 17-ERD-039
OSTI ID:
1545360
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1508680
Journal Information:
Physics of Plasmas, Vol. 26, Issue 4; ISSN 1070-664X
Publisher:
American Institute of Physics (AIP)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 24 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Cited By (2)

Plasma expansion accompanying superthermal electrons in over-picosecond relativistic laser-foil interactions journal October 2019
Proton beam emittance growth in multipicosecond laser-solid interactions journal October 2019

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