TY - GEN

T1 - Narrow Energy Spread Protons and Ions from High-Intensity, High-Contrast Laser Solid Target Interactions

AU - Dollar, Franklin

AU - Matsuoka, Takeshi

AU - McGuffey, Christopher

AU - Bulanov, Stepan S.

AU - Chvykov, Vladimir

AU - Davis, Jack

AU - Kalintchenko, Galina

AU - Petrov, George

AU - Thomas, Alec G. R.

AU - Willingale, Louise

AU - Yanovsky, Victor

AU - Maksimchuk, Anatoly

AU - Krushelnick, Karl

PY - 2010

Y1 - 2010

N2 - Recent simulations show that an idealized, high intensity, short pulse laser can generate quasi-monoenergetic proton beams with energies over 100 MeV in an interaction with a thin film [1]. However, most short pulse laser facilities with sufficient intensity have difficulty controlling the nanosecond and picosecond contrast necessary to realize such a regime. Experiments were performed to investigate proton and ion acceleration from a high contrast, short pulse laser by employing dual plasma mirrors along with a deformable mirror at the HERCULES laser facility at the Center for Ultrafast Optical Sciences, University of Michigan. Plasma mirrors were characterized, allowing a 50% throughput with an intensity contrast increase of 10(5). The focal spot quality was also exceptional, showing a 1.1 micron full width at half maximum (FWHM) focal diameter. Experiments were done using temporally cleaned 30 TW, 32 fs pulses to achieve an intensity of up to 10(21)Wcm(-2) on Si(3)N(4) and Mylar targets with thicknesses ranging 50 nm to 13 microns. Proton beams with energy spreads below 2 MeV were observed from all thicknesses, peaking with energies up to 10.3 MeV and an energy spread of 0.8 MeV. Similar narrow energy spreads were observed for oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon at the silicon nitride thickness of 50 nm with energies up to 24 MeV with an energy spread of 3 MeV, whereas the energy spread is greatly increased at a larger thickness. Maximum energies were confirmed with CR39 track detectors, while a Thomson ion spectrometer was used to gauge the monoenergetic nature of the beam.

AB - Recent simulations show that an idealized, high intensity, short pulse laser can generate quasi-monoenergetic proton beams with energies over 100 MeV in an interaction with a thin film [1]. However, most short pulse laser facilities with sufficient intensity have difficulty controlling the nanosecond and picosecond contrast necessary to realize such a regime. Experiments were performed to investigate proton and ion acceleration from a high contrast, short pulse laser by employing dual plasma mirrors along with a deformable mirror at the HERCULES laser facility at the Center for Ultrafast Optical Sciences, University of Michigan. Plasma mirrors were characterized, allowing a 50% throughput with an intensity contrast increase of 10(5). The focal spot quality was also exceptional, showing a 1.1 micron full width at half maximum (FWHM) focal diameter. Experiments were done using temporally cleaned 30 TW, 32 fs pulses to achieve an intensity of up to 10(21)Wcm(-2) on Si(3)N(4) and Mylar targets with thicknesses ranging 50 nm to 13 microns. Proton beams with energy spreads below 2 MeV were observed from all thicknesses, peaking with energies up to 10.3 MeV and an energy spread of 0.8 MeV. Similar narrow energy spreads were observed for oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon at the silicon nitride thickness of 50 nm with energies up to 24 MeV with an energy spread of 3 MeV, whereas the energy spread is greatly increased at a larger thickness. Maximum energies were confirmed with CR39 track detectors, while a Thomson ion spectrometer was used to gauge the monoenergetic nature of the beam.

KW - Laser produced plasma

KW - ion acceleration

KW - GENERATION

KW - BEAMS

M3 - Conference contribution/Paper

SN - 9780735408531

T3 - AIP Conference Proceedings

SP - 710

EP - 714

BT - ADVANCED ACCELERATOR CONCEPTS

A2 - Gold, S. H.

A2 - Nusinovich, G. S.

PB - AMER INST PHYSICS

T2 - 14th Workshop on Advanced Accelerator Concepts

Y2 - 13 June 2010 through 19 June 2010

ER -