Optimizing electron-positron pair production on kilojoule-class high-intensity lasers for the purpose of pair-plasma creation
- Laboratory for Laser Energetics, University of Rochester, 250 East River Road, Rochester, New York 14623-1299 (United States)
Expressions for the yield of electron-positron pairs, their energy spectra, and production rates have been obtained in the interaction of multi-kJ pulses of high-intensity laser light interacting with solid targets. The Bethe-Heitler conversion of hard x-ray bremsstrahlung [D. A. Gryaznykh, Y. Z. Kandiev, and V. A. Lykov, JETP Lett. 67, 257 (1998); K. Nakashima and H. Takabe, Phys. Plasmas 9, 1505 (2002)] is shown to dominate over direct production (trident process) [E. P. Liang, S. C. Wilks, and M. Tabak, Phys. Rev. Lett. 81, 4887 (1998)]. The yields and production rates have been optimized as a function of incident laser intensity by the choice of target material and dimensions, indicating that up to 5x10{sup 11} pairs can be produced on the OMEGA EP laser system [L. J. Waxer et al., Opt. Photonics News 16, 30 (2005)]. The corresponding production rates are high enough to make possible the creation of a pair plasma.
- OSTI ID:
- 21294306
- Journal Information:
- Physical Review. E, Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics (Print), Vol. 79, Issue 6; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevE.79.066409; (c) 2009 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 1539-3755
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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