The Laser Interaction with Plasma

Laser-produced plasma-wall interaction

Jets of laser–generated plasma represent a flexible and well-defined model environment for investigation of plasma interactions with solid surfaces (walls). The pilot experiments carried out on the iodine laser system (5–200 J, 0.44 mm, 0.25–0.3 ns, ,1 10 W/cm) at the PALS Research Centre in Prague are reported. Modification of macroscopic characteristics of the Al plasma jets produced at laser...

Laser Shaping and Optimization of the Laser-Plasma Interaction

The physics of energy transfer between the laser and the plasma in laser wakefield accelerators is studied. We find that wake excitation by arbitrary laser shapes can be parameterized using the total pulse energy and pulse depletion length. A technique for determining laser profiles that produce the required plasma excitation is developed. We show that by properly shaping the longitudinal profi...

Mathematical Models for Laser-plasma Interaction

We address here mathematical models related to the Laser-Plasma Interaction. After a simplified introduction to the physical background concerning the modelling of the laser propagation and its interaction with a plasma, we recall some classical results about the geometrical optics in plasmas. Then we deal with the well known paraxial approximation of the solution of the Maxwell equation; we st...

Laser-electron Compton Interaction in Plasma Channels

Ion acceleration by superintense laser-plasma interaction

Ion acceleration driven by superintense laser pulses is attracting an impressive and steadily increasing effort. Motivations can be found in the applicative potential and in the perspective to investigate novel regimesasavailable laser intensitieswill be increasing.Experimentshavedemonstrated, over awide range of laser and target parameters, the generation of multi-MeV proton and ion beams with...