Production of Picosecond, Kilojoule, and Petawatt Laser Pulses via Raman Amplification of Nanosecond Pulses

Journal Article · Fri Sep 02 00:00:00 EDT 2011 · Physical Review Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVLETT.107.105002· OSTI ID:21611574

Bingham, R; Norreys, P A ^[1]; Fiuza, F; Fonseca, R A; Silva, L O ^[2]; Cairns, R A ^[3]

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1. Central Laser Facility, STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Didcot, Oxon, OX11 0QX (United Kingdom)
2. GoLP/Instituto de Plasmas e Fusao Nuclear--Laboratorio Associado, Instituto Superior Tecnico, 1049-001 Lisbon (Portugal)
3. University of St. Andrews, St. Andrews, Fife KY16 9AJ (United Kingdom)

Raman amplification in plasma has been promoted as a means of compressing picosecond optical laser pulses to femtosecond duration to explore the intensity frontier. Here we show for the first time that it can be used, with equal success, to compress laser pulses from nanosecond to picosecond duration. Simulations show up to 60% energy transfer from pump pulse to probe pulse, implying that multikilojoule ultraviolet petawatt laser pulses can be produced using this scheme. This has important consequences for the demonstration of fast-ignition inertial confinement fusion.

• OSTI ID: 21611574
• Journal Information: Physical Review Letters, Vol. 107, Issue 10; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.107.105002; (c) 2011 American Institute of Physics; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0031-9007
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
AMPLIFICATION
ENERGY TRANSFER
INERTIAL CONFINEMENT
LASERS
PETAWATT POWER RANGE
PLASMA
PULSES
ULTRAVIOLET RADIATION
CONFINEMENT
ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION
PLASMA CONFINEMENT
POWER RANGE
RADIATIONS