Guiding of high intensity ultrashort laser pulses in plasma channels produced with the dual laser pulse ignitor-heater technique

Technical Report · Wed Jul 01 04:00:00 EDT 1998

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/666050· OSTI ID:666050

Volfbeyn, P; Leemans, W P

The authors present results of experimental investigations of laser guiding in plasma channels. A new technique for plasma channel creation, the Ignitor-Heater scheme is proposed and experimentally tested in hydrogen and nitrogen. It makes use of two laser pulses. The Ignitor, an ultrashort (< 100 fs) laser pulse, is brought to a line focus using a cylindrical lens to ionize the gas. The Heater pulse (160 ps long) is used subsequently to heat the existing spark via inverse Bremsstrahlung. The hydrodynamic shock expansion creates a partially evacuated plasma channel with a density minimum on axis. Such a channel has properties of an optical waveguide. This technique allows creation of plasma channels in low atomic number gases, such as hydrogen, which is of importance for guiding of highly intense laser pulses. The channel density was diagnosed with time resolved longitudinal interferometry. From these measurements the plasma temperature was inferred. The guiding properties of the channels were tested by injecting a > 5 {times} 10{sup 17} W/cm{sup 2}, 75 fs laser pulse.

• Research Organization: Lawrence Berkeley National Lab., Center for Beam Physics, Berkeley, CA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Energy Research, Washington, DC (United States)
• DOE Contract Number: AC03-76SF00098
• OSTI ID: 666050
• Report Number(s): LBNL--42122; CBP-Note--266; CONF-980742--; ON: DE98059384
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS
BEAM-PLASMA SYSTEMS
EXPERIMENTAL DATA
HOMOGENEOUS PLASMA
HYDROGEN
LASER RADIATION
LIGHT TRANSMISSION
PLASMA DENSITY
PLASMA DIAGNOSTICS
PLASMA PRODUCTION
WAKEFIELD ACCELERATORS