Laser hole boring is a process of ion expulsion from the path of an intense laser beam under the effect of the ponderomotive force. It is considered as a method for more efficient electron energy deposition in fast ignition of inertial fusion reactions. Analysis of the electron dynamics on the laser-plasma interface shows that the hole boring efficiency can be significantly enhanced by an appropriate temporal shaping of the laser pulse. The pulse shape optimization is carried out with a newly developed fast quasi-neutral particle-in-cell (PIC) code and verified with the full PIC simulations.
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