Laser-driven proton scaling laws and new paths towards energy increase

Abstract

International audienceThe past few years have seen remarkable progress in the development of laser-based particle accelerators. The ability to produce ultrabright beams of multi-megaelectronvolt protons routinely has many potential uses from engineering to medicine, but for this potential to be realized substantial improvements in the performances of these devices must be made. Here we show that in the laser-driven accelerator that has been demonstrated experimentally to produce the highest energy protons, scaling laws derived from fluid models and supported by numerical simulations can be used to accurately describe the acceleration of proton beams for a large range of laser and target parameters. This enables us to evaluate the laser parameters needed to produce high-energy and high-quality proton beams of interest for radiography of dense objects or proton therapy of deep-seated tumours

Investigations of Field Dynamics in Laser Plasmas with Proton Imaging

“…The acceleration time t seems to be the critical parameter. The scaling with the pulse duration (t ≈ 1.3τ ) which was found in reference [2] agrees well with experiments with pulse durations of τ L > 100 fs. But for ultra-short pulses τ L < 100 fs this scaling can not be used further without any restrictions (cf.…”

“…The best fit to experimental data was found in reference [2] with t ≈ 1.3τ L . For a laser pulse with I L = 2 · 10 19 W/cm 2 and τ L = 40 fs, the maximum proton energy can be estimated:…”

“…Using the scaling laws given in reference [2], one can calculate the hot electron temperature T h of the electrons produced by the CPA2 laser pulse:…”

“…They could be injected into common accelerators, benefitting from the unique attributes of the beams [2,3]. Further on, the advantages of laser induced proton beams are discussed in the scope of cancer therapy [4,5].…”

“…Different applications established recently benefit from these beam attributes. High-energy-density matter can be created, which is of interest for astrophysics [1,2]. Furthermore, these beams are predestined for temporally and 1 spatially resolved pump-probe experiments.…”