Synchronized Ion Acceleration by Ultraintense Slow Light

Influence of radiation reaction force on ultraintense laser-driven ion acceleration.

The role of the radiation reaction force in ultraintense laser-driven ion acceleration is investigated. For laser intensities ∼10(23)W/cm(2), the action of this force on electrons is demonstrated in relativistic particle-in-cell simulations to significantly enhance the energy transfer to ions in relativistically transparent targets, but strongly reduce the ion energy in dense plasma targets. An...

Electron Acceleration Using an Ultrashort Ultraintense Laser Pulse

Ion acceleration by beating electrostatic waves: domain of allowed acceleration.

The conditions under which a magnetized ion can be accelerated through a nonlinear interaction with a pair of beating electrostatic waves are explored. It has been shown [Benisti et al., Phys. Plasma 5, 3224 (1998)] that the electric field of the beating waves can, under some conditions, accelerate ions from arbitrarily low initial velocity in stark contrast with the well-known nonlinear thresh...

Ion acceleration by superintense laser-plasma interaction

Ion acceleration driven by superintense laser pulses is attracting an impressive and steadily increasing effort. Motivations can be found in the applicative potential and in the perspective to investigate novel regimesasavailable laser intensitieswill be increasing.Experimentshavedemonstrated, over awide range of laser and target parameters, the generation of multi-MeV proton and ion beams with...

Ion acceleration by hot electrons in microclusters

A self-consistent analytical description is presented for collisionless expansion of a fully ionized cluster with a two-component electron distribution. The problem is solved for an initial “water-bag” distribution of hot electrons with no angular momentum, which reflects the mechanism of electron heating. This distribution evolves in time due to adiabatic cooling of hot electrons. The solution...