Hannover 2016 – scientific programme
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P: Fachverband Plasmaphysik
P 19: Poster Session- Laser Plasmas
P 19.2: Poster
Wednesday, March 2, 2016, 16:30–19:00, Empore Lichthof
Kinetic effects in strongly coupled Brillouin laser seed pulse amplification — •Götz Lehmann and Karl-Heinz Spatschek — HHU Düsseldorf, 40255 Düsseldorf
Today laser intensities on the order of 1022 W/cm2 can be achieved via chirped pulse amplification. Due to the damage thresholds of amplifier crystals and compressor gratings, laser systems which offer intensities magnitudes larger are either extremely costly or unrealistic. Plasma-based concepts such as Brillouin amplification offer a potential route towards lasers on the scale of 100 PW or even beyond.
In Brillouin amplification a long and energetic pump pulse is backscattered into a short seed pulse off an ion oscillation [1,2]. For sufficiently strong pump pulses, the beat of pump and seed drives a strongly-coupled ion oscillation, which acts as a Bragg grating, backscattering the pump into the seed.
The amplification dynamics is often modeled by envelope models. With the help of Maxwell-Vlasov simulations we explore the validity of these models and establish the role of kinetic effects on the grating. We find that strong electron trapping determines the late time dynamics of the Bragg grating, however the amplification process is not significantly affected by this.
[1] G. Lehmann and K.H. Spatschek, Phys. Plasmas 20, 073112 (2013) [2] F. Schluck, G. Lehmann and K.H. Spatschek, Phys. Plasmas 22, 043105 (2015)