An intense isotropic source of multicharged carbon and oxygen ions with energy above 300 keV and particle number >108 per shot was obtained by femtosecond Ti:Sa laser irradiation of submicron clusters. The source was employed for high-contrast contact ionography images with 600 nm spatial resolution. A variation in object thickness of 100 nm was well resolved for both Zr and polymer foils.
Laser-driven ion acceleration has been experimentally investigated by irradiating, with tightly focused femtosecond laser pulses at 5 x 10(19) W/cm(2), thin metal foils, which have been back-coated with a mu m thick dielectric layer. The observation we report shows the production of MeV proton bunches with an unexpected highly uniform spatial cross section. (C) 2009 American Institute of Physics. [doi: 10.1063/1.3251425
A study of the dynamics of the x-ray emission from a point-like Al plasma produced by tight-focusing laser irradiation of a thick target is reported. Two-dimensional maps of the x-ray emission calculated at selected wavelengths show that, due to the rapid expansion cooling, x-ray emission mostly originates from a thin spatial layer. These properties enabled the results of the simulations to be compared with time-resolved x-ray spectra obtained under well-controlled experimental conditions. The outcome of this comparison is discussed in details, in view of the results reported in a recently published Letter [L. A. Gizzi, C. A. Cecchetti, M. Galimberti, A. Giulietti, D. Giulietti, L. Labate, S. Laville, and B. Tomassini, Phys. Plasmas 10, 4601 (2003)]. Moreover, the x-ray-reabsorption issues and the role of the Doppler decoupling mechanism in the presence of the strong velocity gradient typical of our experimental condition are discussed, also in view of a possible dedicated experiment. (c) 2005 American Institute of Physics
Time-resolved x-ray spectroscopy has been used to investigate ionization dynamics of a micrometer-sized nanosecond laser-plasma during the plasma start-up phase. Experimental results are modeled using two-dimensional hydrodynamic simulations and time-dependent collisional-radiative calculations. The study clearly shows that, due to the rapid expansion cooling, x-ray emission originates predominantly from a well-localized plasma region characterized by rapidly evolving hydrodynamic conditions. In this region, ionization dynamics is found to depart substantially from the steady-state regime. The measurements provide clear evidence of this transient ionization regime showing good agreement with the time-dependent calculations. (C) 2003 American Institute of Physics
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