New scheme for enhancement of maximum proton energy with a cone-hole target irradiated by a short intense laser pulse

Abstract

Improvement of proton energy from short intense laser interaction with a new proposal of a cone-hole target is investigated via two-dimensional particle-in-cell simulations. The configuration of the target is a cone structure with a hole of changeable diameter through the center of the tip, with proton layers contaminated both on the target rear surface and at the rear part of the hole. In the interacting process, the cone-hole geometry enables the focus of the laser pulse by the cone structure and the consequent penetration of the intensified laser through the tip along the hole instead of reflection, which can increase the energy coupling from laser field to plasmas. The heated electrons, following the target normal sheath acceleration scheme, induce a much stronger electrostatic field in the longitudinal direction at the rear surface of the target than that in the traditional foil case. The simulation results indicate that the accelerated proton beam from the cone-hole target has a cutoff energy about 5.7 and 2.1 times larger than the foil case and the hollow cone case, respectively. Furthermore, the case of the cone-hole target without the proton layer in the hole is also analyzed to demonstrate the effect of the proton layer position and the results show that not only can the existence of the central proton layer improve the proton energy but also lead to a better collimation. The dependence of proton energy on the hole diameter and the scaling law of the maximum proton energy relative to laser intensity are also presented.

Modeling the interaction of an ultra-high intensity laser pulse with nano-layered flat-top cone targets for ion acceleration

“…Some works showed that the interaction of the ultra-high intensity laser pulse with a micro-cone target can generate protons accelerated at energies of tens of MeV with low angular divergence and high laser absorption [9][10][11][12] in the Target Normal Sheath Acceleration and Direct laser-lightpressure regimes. Other papers were devoted to different kinds of cone targets suitable for proton acceleration at energies up to few tens of MeV [13][14][15][16][17][18]. A new experiment at Vulcan facility shows that the interaction of the ultra-high intensity laser pulse with a ultra-thin foil can generate protons accelerated at energies exceeding 94 MeV [19].…”

Enhanced long-distance transport of periodic electron beams in an advanced double layer cone-channel target

“…© 2018 Author (s) In recent years, the laser-plasma interactions have been developing rapidly with the advance in the laser technology. The generation and transportation of fast electrons in dense plasmas have attracted much attention due to the potential applications in the fast ignition (FI) of inertial confinement fusion (ICF), 1,2 ion acceleration, [3][4][5] and laboratory astrophysics, 6 and so on. In order to fulfill these applications, it is critical to not only generate but also control such beams appropriately, such as collimating and guiding them over certain distances.…”