Intensity scaling limitations of laser-driven proton acceleration in the TNSA-regime

Keppler, Sebastian; Elkina, N. V.; Becker, Georg; Hein, Joachim; Hornung, Marco; Mäusezahl, Max; Rödel, Christian; Tamer, Issa; Zepf, M.; Kaluza, Malte C.

doi:10.1103/physrevresearch.4.013065

Cited by 9 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 60 publications

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“…Experimental demonstration of ion beams by several mechanisms exhibiting different performances, such as target normal sheath acceleration (TNSA) [10] , radiation-pressure acceleration (RPA) [11][12][13] , collisionless shock acceleration (CSA) [14,15] , the breakout afterburner (BOA) [16][17][18][19] , etc., has already been achieved [20] . Significant efforts of innovative laser/target configurations have also been made to push the number of ion beam characteristics (energies and flux) [21] , yet the highest gained energy is still less than 100 MeV/u [20,22,23] . Nevertheless, the prospects of achieving even higher ion energies with the next generation of laser sources are promising [24] .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Energy enhancement of laser-driven ions by radiation reaction and Breit–Wheeler pair production in the ultra-relativistic transparency regime

Bhadoria,

Marklund,

Keitel

2023

High Pow Laser Sci Eng

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The impact of radiation reaction and Breit-Wheeler pair production on the acceleration of fully ionized carbon ions driven by an intense linearly polarized laser pulse has been investigated in the ultra-relativistic transparency regime. Against initial expectations, the radiation reaction and pair production at ultra-high laser intensities are found to enhance the energy gained by the ions. The electrons lose most of their transverse momentum, and the additionally produced pair plasma of Breit-Wheeler electrons and positrons co-streams in the forward direction as opposed to the existing electrons streaming at an angle above zero degree. We discuss how these observations could be explained by the changes in the phase velocity of the Buneman instability, which is known to aid ion acceleration in the breakout afterburner regime, by tapping the free energy in the relative electron and ion streams. We present evidence that these non-classical effects can further improve the highest carbon ion energies in this transparency regime.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Energy enhancement of laser-driven ions by radiation reaction and Breit–Wheeler pair production in the ultra-relativistic transparency regime

Bhadoria,

Marklund,

Keitel

2023

High Pow Laser Sci Eng

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“…While previously ions were accelerated predominantly by target normal sheath acceleration (TNSA) to up to 10's of MeV, state-of-the-art PW-systems with improved temporal laser contrast reach new acceleration regimes. As such, radiation pressure acceleration and relativistic induced transparency accelerate ions within subps laser-plasma interactions resulting in pronounced angular emission characteristics [5] . At these acceleration parameters protons approaching the 100 MeV kinetic energy barrier as well as carbon ions exceeding 80 MeV/u have been observed [6][7][8] .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This gradient is induced by the Braggpeak for mono-energetic ion beams. Laser-accelerated ion beams, however, typically exhibit an exponential ion energy spectrum with certain additional features depending on the acceleration regime [1,5,7] . These spectra range over orders of magnitude and the corresponding energy densities deposited in matter are typically dominated by the low-energy particles.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ion-bunch energy acoustic tracing by modulation of the depth-dose curve

Prasselsperger

Balling

Wieser

et al. 2023

High Pow Laser Sci Eng

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Characterizing exact energy density distributions for laser-accelerated ion bunches in a medium is challenging due to very high beam intensities and the electro-magnetic pulse (EMP) emitted in the laser-plasma interaction. Ion-bunch energy acoustic tracing (I-BEAT) allows for reconstructing the spatial energy density from the ionoacoustic wave generated upon impact in water. We have extended this approach to tracing ionoacoustic modulations of broad energy distributions (TIMBRE) by introducing thin foils in the water reservoir to shape the acoustic waves at distinct points along the depthdose curve. Here, we present first simulation studies of this new detector and reconstruction approach which provides on-line read-out of the deposited energy with depth within centimeter range behind the ion source of state-of-the-art laser-plasma based accelerators.

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“…In the quest for enhancing TNSA ion energies, researchers have tried using lasers with ever increasing peak intensities (currently exceeding I = 10 21 W cm −2 ) and reducing target thickness [16]. It has been documented that ion cutoff energy is a function of many different parameters and is not well described by the intensity alone [17][18][19]. Scaling laws have been discovered for intensity, target thickness, focal spot size, pulse duration and pulse energy [18,20].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Novel approach to TNSA enhancement using multi-layered targets—a numerical study

Hadjikyriacou

Pšikal

Kuchařík

et al. 2023

Plasma Phys. Control. Fusion

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In the context of ion acceleration driven by ultra-high contrast lasers using thin foils, there is a clear trend towards increasing ion energy when the target thickness is reduced. However when the target is too thin and the prepulse strength is not negligible, this trend is reversed due to degradation of the target mainly caused by prepulse-induced shocks, among other effects (thermal plasma expansion, early onset of transparency, etc.). In this paper, we propose and motivate the use of multi-layered targets for the purpose of enhancing the TNSA mechanism by means of attenuating the shock waves inside the target. It is demonstrated through hydrodynamic simulations that multi-layered targets, composed of alternating layers of plastic and gold, can significantly delay the time of shock wave breakout, reducing the shock energy that breaks out of the target and shortening the plasma scale-length. This approach paves the way for enhanced laser-driven ion acceleration using thinner targets even for relatively low contrast lasers.

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Intensity scaling limitations of laser-driven proton acceleration in the TNSA-regime

Cited by 9 publications

References 60 publications

Energy enhancement of laser-driven ions by radiation reaction and Breit–Wheeler pair production in the ultra-relativistic transparency regime

Energy enhancement of laser-driven ions by radiation reaction and Breit–Wheeler pair production in the ultra-relativistic transparency regime

Ion-bunch energy acoustic tracing by modulation of the depth-dose curve

Novel approach to TNSA enhancement using multi-layered targets—a numerical study

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