Generation of Ultrahigh Intensity Laser Pulses
Authors: N.J. Fisch and V.M. Malkin
Date of PPPL Report: June 2003
Published in: Physics of Plasmas 10, Issue 5 (May 2003) 2056-2063.
Mainly due to the method of chirped pulse amplification, laser intensities have grown remarkably during recent years. However, the attaining of very much higher powers is limited by the material properties of gratings. These limitations might be overcome through the use of plasma, which is an ideal medium for processing very high power and very high total energy. A plasma can be irradiated by a long pump laser pulse, carrying significant energy, which is then quickly depleted in the plasma by a short counter-propagating pulse. This counter-propagating wave effect has already been employed in Raman amplifiers using gases or plasmas at low laser power. Of particular interest here are the new effects which enter in high power regimes. These new effects can be employed so that one high-energy optical system can be used like a flashlamp in what amounts to pumping the plasma, and a second low-power optical system can be used to extract quickly the energy from the plasma and focus it precisely. The combined system can be very compact. Thus, focused intensities more than 1025 W/cm2 can be contemplated using existing optical elements. These intensities are several orders of magnitude higher than what is currently available through chirped pump amplifiers.