Two nonlinear theoretical models are presented to describe the time evolution of a plasma density grating induced by intersecting high power laser beams. The first model is based on the fluid equations, while the second is a kinetic model that adopts the particle mesh method. It is found that both models can describe the plasma density grating formation at different stages, well beyond the linear growth stage. However, the saturation of the plasma density grating, which is attributed to the kinetic effect of "ion wave-breaking", can only be predicted by the second model based on the particle mesh method. Using the second model, we also find that the saturation time of the plasma density grating increases with the plasma density and decreases with the laser intensity. The results from these two nonlinear theoretical models are compared and verified using particle-in-cell simulations.

The first laser–plasma interaction experiment using lasers of eight beams grouped into one octad has been conducted on the Shenguang Octopus facility. Although each beam intensity is below its individual threshold for stimulated Brillouin backscattering (SBS), collective behaviors are excited to enhance the octad SBS. In particular, when two-color/cone lasers with wavelength separation 0.3 nm are used, the backward SBS reflectivities show novel behavior in which beams of longer wavelength achieve higher SBS gain. This property of SBS can be attributed to the rotation of the wave vectors of common ion acoustic waves due to the competition of detunings between geometrical angle and wavelength separation. This mechanism is confirmed using massively parallel supercomputer simulations with the three-dimensional laser–plasma interaction code LAP3D.

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The subgrid-scale (SGS) terms of turbulence transport are modelled by the stretched-vortex SGS stress model, and a large-eddy simulation code multi-viscous fluid and turbulence (MVFT) is developed to investigate the MVFT problems. Then one AWE shock tube experiment of interface instability is simulated numerically by MVFT code, which reproduces the development process of the interface. The obtained numerical images of interface evolution and wave structures in flow field are consistent with the experimental results. The evolution of perturbed interface and propagation of shock waves in flow field and their interactions are analyzed in detail. The statistics features of turbulence mixing in the form of finer quantities, such as the turbulent kinetic energy, enstrophy, density variance, and turbulent mass flux are investigated, which also proves that the SGS model has a key role in large-eddy simulation. The turbulent kinetic energy and enstrophy decay with time as a power law.

Broadband low-coherence light is considered to be an effective way to suppress laser plasma instability. Recent studies have demonstrated the ability of low-coherence laser facilities to reduce back-scattering during beam–target coupling. However, to ensure simultaneous low coherence and high energy, complex spectral modulation methods and amplification routes have to be adopted. In this work, we propose the use of a random fiber laser (RFL) as the seed source. The spectral features of this RFL can be carefully tailored to provide a good match with the gain characteristics of the laser amplification medium, thus enabling efficient amplification while maintaining low coherence. First, a theoretical model is constructed to give a comprehensive description of the output characteristics of the spectrum-tailored RFL, after which the designed RFL is experimentally realized as a seed source. Through precise pulse shaping and efficient regenerative amplification, a shaped random laser pulse output of 28 mJ is obtained, which is the first random laser system with megawatt-class peak power that is able to achieve low coherence and efficient spectrum-conformal regenerative amplification.