International audienceA high-power pulsed laser is focused onto a solid-hydrogen target to accelerate forward a collimated stream of protons in the range 0.1–1 MeV, carrying a very high energy of about 30 J (∼5% laser-ion conversion efficiency) and extremely large charge of about ∼0.1  mC per laser pulse. This result is achieved for the first time through the combination of a sophisticated target system (H2 thin ribbon) operating at cryogenic temperature (∼10  K) and a very hot H plasma (∼300  keV “hot electron” temperature) generated by a subnanosecond laser with an intensity of ∼3×1016  W/cm2. Both the H plasma and the accelerated proton beam are fully characterized by in situ and ex situ diagnostics. Results obtained using the ELISE (experiments on laser interaction with solid hydrogen) H2 target delivery system at PALS (Prague) kJ-class laser facility are presented and discussed along with potential multidisciplinary applications

Silicon photonics is one of the most prominent technology platforms for integrated photonics and can support a wide variety of applications. As we move towards a mature industrial core technology, we present the integration of silicon nitride (SiN) material to extend the capabilities of our silicon photonics platform. Depending on the application being targeted, we have developed several integration strategies for the incorporation of SiN. We present these processes, as well as key components for dedicated applications. In particular, we present the use of SiN for athermal multiplexing in optical transceivers for datacom applications, the nonlinear generation of frequency combs in SiN micro-resonators for ultra-high data rate transmission, spectroscopy or metrology applications and the use of SiN to realize optical phased arrays in the 800–1000 nm wavelength range for Light Detection And Ranging (LIDAR) applications. These functionalities are demonstrated using a 200 mm complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS)-compatible pilot line, showing the versatility and scalability of the Si-SiN platform.

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