No Arabic abstract
An ultrarelativistic electron beam passing through an intense laser pulse emits radiation around its direction of propagation into a characteristic angular profile. Here we show that measurement of the variances of this profile in the planes parallel and perpendicular to the laser polarization, and the mean initial and final energies of the electron beam, allows the intensity of the laser pulse to be inferred in way that is independent of the model of the electron dynamics. The method presented applies whether radiation reaction is important or not, and whether it is classical or quantum in nature, with accuracy of a few per cent across three orders of magnitude in intensity. It is tolerant of electron beams with broad energy spread and finite divergence. In laser-electron beam collision experiments, where spatiotemporal fluctuations cause alignment of the beams to vary from shot to shot, this permits inference of the laser intensity at the collision point, thereby facilitating comparisons between theoretical calculations and experimental data.
Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) show enhancement in its signal, when the laser-induced plasma is confined/decelerated under the effect of an external steady magnetic field or in a small cavity. An enhancement in LIBS signal has been observed ~2 times in the case of magnetic confinement. Combination of magnetic and spatial confinement provide enhancement by an order of magnitude. Theoretical analysis of the decelerated plasma has been found in agreement with the experimental observations. The enhancement in LIBS signal is found dependent on the efficiency of plasma confinement as well as on the time duration of laser. The saturation in LIBS signal at higher laser intensity is found correlated with electron-ion collision frequency as well as on the dynamics and instability of plasma plume. Possibility of further enhancement in emission has also been discussed.
We measured, using Petawatt-level pulses, the average ion energy and neutron yield in high-intensity laser interactions with molecular clusters as a function of laser intensity. The interaction volume over which fusion occurred (1-10 mm^3) was larger than previous investigations, owing to the high laser power. Possible effects of prepulses were examined by implementing a pair of plasma mirrors. Our results show an optimum laser intensity for the production of energetic deuterium ions both with and without the use of the plasma mirrors. We measured deuterium plasmas with 14 keV average ion energies, which produced 7.2x10^6 and 1.6x10^7 neutrons in a single shot with and without plasma mirrors, respectively. The measured neutron yields qualitatively matched the expected yields calculated using a cylindrical plasma model.
Direct laser acceleration (DLA) of electrons in a plasma of near critical electron density (NCD) and associated synchrotron-like radiation are discussed for moderate relativistic laser intensity (the normalized laser amplitude $a_0$ $leq$ 4.3) and ps-long pulse. This regime is typical for kJ PW-class laser facilities designed for high energy density research. Currently, in experiments at the PHELX laser it was demonstrated that interaction of 10$^{19}$ W/cm$^{2}$ sub-ps laser pulse with sub-mm long NCD plasma results in generation of high-current well-directed super-ponderomotive electrons with effective temperature that is 10$times$ higher than the ponderomotive potential [O. Rosmej et al., PPCF 62, 115024 (2020)]. Three-dimensional Particle-In-Cell simulations provided a good agreement with the measured electron energy distribution and were used in the current work to study synchrotron radiation of the DLA accelerated electrons. The resulting x-ray spectrum with a critical energy of 5 keV reveals an ultra-high photon number of 7$times$10$^{11}$ in the 1-30 keV photon energy range at the focused laser energy of 20 J. Numerical simulations of a betatron x-ray phasecontrast imaging based on the DLA process for the parameters of a PHELIX laser is presented. The results are of interest for applications in high energy density (HED) experiments, which require a picosecond x-ray pulse and a high photon flux.
Interaction of an electron with the counter-propagating electromagnetic wave is studied theoretically and with the particle-in-cell simulations in the regime of quantum radiation reaction. We find the electron energy in the center of the laser pulse, as it is a key factor for testing the non-linear quantum electrodynamics vacuum properties in the laser-electron collision in the regime of multi-photon Compton scattering and vacuum Cherenkov radiation. With multiparametric analysis we provide the conditions on electron initial energy for reaching the center of the laser pulse and emitting Cherenkov photons.
The goals of discovering quantum radiation dynamics in high-intensity laser-plasma interactions and engineering new laser-driven high-energy particle sources both require accurate and robust predictions. Experiments rely on particle-in-cell simulations to predict and interpret outcomes, but unknowns in modeling the interaction limit the simulations to qualitative predictions, too uncertain to test the quantum theory. To establish a basis for quantitative prediction, we introduce a `jet observable that parameterizes the emitted photon distribution and quantifies a highly directional flux of high-energy photon emission. Jets are identified by the observable under a variety of physical conditions and shown to be most prominent when the laser pulse forms a wavelength-scale channel through the target. The highest energy photons are generally emitted in the direction of the jet. The observable is compatible with characteristics of photon emission from quantum theory. This work offers quantitative guidance for the design of experiments and detectors, offering a foundation to use photon emission to interpret dynamics during high-intensity laser-plasma experiments and validate quantum radiation theory in strong fields.