Guided propagation of extremely intense lasers in plasma via ion motion

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Wang, Wei-Min and Sheng, Zheng-Ming and Wilson, Thomas and Li, Yu-Tong and Zhang, Jie (2020) Guided propagation of extremely intense lasers in plasma via ion motion. Physical Review E: Statistical Physics, Plasmas, Fluids, and Related Interdisciplinary Topics, 101 (1). 011201(R). ISSN 2470-0053 (https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.101.011201)

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Abstract

The upcoming 10–100 PW laser facilities may deliver laser pulses with unprecedented intensity of 1022–1025Wcm−2. Such laser pulses interacting with ultrarelativistic electrons accelerated in plasma can trigger various nonlinear quantum electrodynamic processes. Usually, ion motion is expected to be ignorable since the laser intensities below 1025Wcm−2 are underrelativistic for ions. Here, we find that ion motion becomes significant even with the intensity around 1022Wcm−2 when electron cavitation is formed by the strong laser ponderomotive force. Due to the electron cavitation, guided laser propagation becomes impossible via usual plasma electron response to laser fields. However, we find that ion response to the laser fields may effectively guide laser propagation at such high intensity levels. The corresponding conditions of the required ion density distribution and laser power are presented and verified by three-dimensional particle-in-cell simulations.

ORCID iDs

Wang, Wei-Min, Sheng, Zheng-Ming ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8823-9993, Wilson, Thomas ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6140-7045, Li, Yu-Tong and Zhang, Jie;
  • Item type:Article
    ID code:71254
    Dates:
    Date
    Event
    16 January 2020
    Published
    13 December 2019
    Accepted
    Subjects:Science > Physics
    Department:Faculty of Science > Physics
    Depositing user: Pure Administrator
    Date deposited:28 Jan 2020 16:34
    Last modified:15 Dec 2024 01:29
    URI:https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/id/eprint/71254
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