Measurements of the highest acceleration gradient for ions produced with a long laser pulse

0342570 - FZÚ 2011 RIV US eng J - Journal Article
Margarone, Daniele - Krása, Josef - Láska, Leoš - Velyhan, Andriy - Mocek, Tomáš - Prokůpek, J. - Krouský, Eduard - Pfeifer, Miroslav - Gammino, S. - Torrisi, L. - Ullschmied, Jiří - Rus, Bedřich
Measurements of the highest acceleration gradient for ions produced with a long laser pulse.
Review of Scientific Instruments. Roč. 81, č. 2 (2010), 02A506/1-02A506/4. ISSN 0034-6748. E-ISSN 1089-7623
R&D Projects: GA MŠMT(CZ) 7E08099; GA AV ČR IAA100100715
EU Projects: European Commission(XE) 212105 - ELI-PP
Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z10100523; CEZ:AV0Z20430508
Keywords : deconvolution * high-speed optical techniques * laser beam applications * plasma accelerators * plasma diagnostics * plasma light propagation
Subject RIV: BH - Optics, Masers, Lasers
Impact factor: 1.598, year: 2010

Ultrafast plasma light ion streams have been produced using the 300 ps, kJ-class iodine laser, operating at PALS in Prague. Ion detection was performed through standard ion collectors (IC) in time-of-flight configuration (TOF), shielded by thin metallic absorbers. This new diagnostics technique has been theoretically studied and experimentally tested in order to cut the long photopeak contribution and to analyze the ultrafast particle signal. Processing the obtained experimental IC-TOF data, including deconvolution processes of the TOF signals, UV/soft-x-ray photopeak absorption, and ion transmission calculations for different metallic filters, is shown. Mainly amorphous carbon targets have been irradiated in order to limit the maximum number of ion charge states and to focus our study on demonstrating the validity of the proposed investigation technique. Maximum ion energy and acceleration gradient estimations as a function of the laser energy and focal spot diameter are reported.
Permanent Link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0185273