Enhanced ion acceleration using the high-energy petawatt PETAL laser
- D. Raffestin
- L. Lecherbourg
- I. Lantuéjoul
- B. Vauzour
- P. E. Masson-Laborde
- X. Davoine
- N. Blanchot
- J. L. Dubois
- X. Vaisseau
- E. d’Humières
- L. Gremillet
- A. Duval
- Ch. Reverdin
- B. Rosse
- G. Boutoux
- J. E. Ducret
- Ch. Rousseaux
- V. Tikhonchuk
- D. Batani
DOIAbstract
The high-energy petawatt PETAL laser system was commissioned at CEA’s Laser Mégajoule facility during the 2017–2018 period. This paper reports in detail on the first experimental results obtained at PETAL on energetic particle and photon generation from solid foil targets, with special emphasis on proton acceleration. Despite a moderately relativistic (<1019 W/cm2) laser intensity, proton energies as high as 51 MeV have been measured significantly above those expected from preliminary numerical simulations using idealized interaction conditions. Multidimensional hydrodynamic and kinetic simulations, taking into account the actual laser parameters, show the importance of the energetic electron production in the extended low-density preplasma...
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