Optimization for high-energy and high-efficiency broadband optical parametric chirped-pulse amplification in LBO near 800  nm

Abstract

In this Letter, we present a study of high-energy and high-conversion-efficiency broadband optical parametric chirped-pulse amplification (OPCPA) system with a 100 mm×100 mm×17 mm LBO crystal near 800 nm. The results showed that the back-conversion was sensitively affected by the pump intensity and the injected signal intensity. It occurred when the injected signal was above 0.82 J with a pump energy of 170 J, and this effect also reshaped the amplified spectrum. After optimization, an amplified energy of 45.3 J was achieved with a conversion efficiency of 26.3% by the OPCPA. The peak power of the hybrid CPA-OPCPA laser system reached 1.02 PW with a compressed duration of 32 fs, which is the first reported OPCPA peak power higher than 1 PW, to the best of our knowledge.

Generation and Parametric Amplification of Few‐Cycle Light Pulses at Relativistic Intensities

“…Owing to the high contrast achievable by OPCPA, it has become popular to combine an OPCPA frontend with one or multiple successive conventional laser amplifiers that boost the pulse energy to the desired value [40,167]. Experiments with the inverted scheme (Ti:Sa frontend, OPCPA booster) have also been reported [38]. Regarding the pulse duration, however, these schemes are restricted to the region >10 fs.…”

“…This applies also for the ambitious OPAL and XCEL projects that seek to bring OPCPA at moderate bandwidth to the kilojoule-level. , LWS-pro [107], Ecole Polytechnique [126], LWS20 [44], ELI-ALPS Sylos [165], CELIA [34], ELI-ALPS HF [167], Apollon 10 PW [40], OPAL [168], ATLAS [169], ELI-NP HPLS [39], SIOM-SULF [12,38], XCEL [170], Astra-Gemeni [171], BELLA [32], Vulcan [43,172], POLARIS [173], PENELOPE [174], Texas PW [31]. It should be noted that the plot does not provide any information about the repetition rate.…”

Linear angular dispersion compensation of cleaned self-diffraction light with a single prism

“…Peta watt (PW) level laser systems, with focused laser peak intensity of about 10 22 W/cm 2 or even higher, have been reported repeatedly [1][2][3][4][5][6] . These extremely high intensity conditions have aroused new interest in exploring lasermatter interactions, such as particle acceleration, bright X-ray source generation, and inertial confinement fusion [7,8] .…”

Numerical Simulations of Transfer of Spatial Beam Aberrations in Optical Parametric Chirped-Pulse Amplification

“…Optical parametric amplification (OPA) is an efficient approach of generating tunable pulses from a fixed laser source [4][5][6], including large energy fiber laser sources [7,8]. The integration of OPA and CPA into optical parametric chirpedpulse amplification (OPCPA) has rapidly extended the peak power of amplified ultra-short laser pulses to the petawatt level due to unique features of efficient conversion, high gain, and broad bandwidth [9][10][11][12][13].…”