Erlangen 2018 – scientific programme

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P: Fachverband Plasmaphysik

P 24: Laser Plasmas II

P 24.1: Invited Talk

Thursday, March 8, 2018, 10:30–11:00, KI 1.174

Transient plasma photonic crystals as novel optical devices for high-intensity lasers — •Götz Lehmann and Karl-Heinz Spatschek — Institut für Theoretische Physik I, Heinrich-Heine Universität, 40225 Düsseldorf

The ponderomotive beat of counter-propagating laser pulses can lead to the formation of very strong plasma density modulations. These modulations are transient and can act as a plasma photonic crystal and may be used to manipulate high-intensity laser pulses. The damage threshold of these plasma structures is more than five orders of magnitudes larger than for conventional solid-state devices. Plasma photonic crystals have been proposed as highly reflective Bragg-type mirrors [1,2] for high-intensity lasers. Wide band-gaps make these mirrors suitable for ultra-short (20 fs) and intense laser (10¹⁷ W/cm²) laser pulses. The periodic density modulations can also lead to birefringence and thus allow to use plasma as a phase-plate for high-intensity lasers [3]. The presentation will discuss the generation of plasma photonic crystals and their application as mirrors and phase-plates. Possible further future applications based on more complex plasma structures will be presented in the outlook.

[1] G. Lehmann and K.H. Spatschek, Phys. Rev. Lett. 116, 225002 (2016), [2] G. Lehmann and K.H. Spatschek, Phys. Plasmas 24, 056701 (2017), [3] P. Michel, L. Divol, D. Turnbull, and J.D. Moody, Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 205001 (2014)