Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-gtxcr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-24T20:22:21.772Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Comparison of femtosecond laser-driven proton acceleration using nanometer and micrometer thick target foils

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 December 2011

M. Schnürer ,
A.A. Andreev ,
S. Steinke ,
T. Sokollik ,
T. Paasch-Colberg ,
P.V. Nickles ,
A. Henig ,
D. Jung ,
D. Kiefer  and
R. Hörlein
...Show all authors
M. Schnürer*
Affiliation:
Max-Born-Institut, Berlin, Germany
A.A. Andreev
Affiliation:
Max-Born-Institut, Berlin, Germany STC “Vavilov State Optical Institute,”St. Petersburg, Russia
S. Steinke
Affiliation:
Max-Born-Institut, Berlin, Germany
T. Sokollik
Affiliation:
Max-Born-Institut, Berlin, Germany Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California University of California, Berkeley, California
T. Paasch-Colberg
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Quantenoptik, Garching, Germany
P.V. Nickles
Affiliation:
Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology, GIST, Republic of Korea
A. Henig
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Quantenoptik, Garching, Germany Department für Physik, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Garching, Germany
D. Jung
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Quantenoptik, Garching, Germany Department für Physik, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Garching, Germany
D. Kiefer
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Quantenoptik, Garching, Germany Department für Physik, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Garching, Germany
R. Hörlein
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Quantenoptik, Garching, Germany Department für Physik, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Garching, Germany
J. Schreiber
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Quantenoptik, Garching, Germany Department für Physik, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Garching, Germany
T. Tajima
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Quantenoptik, Garching, Germany Photomedical Research Center, JAEA, Kyoto, Japan
D. Habs
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Quantenoptik, Garching, Germany Department für Physik, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Garching, Germany
W. Sandner
Affiliation:
Max-Born-Institut, Berlin, Germany Technische Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany
*
Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Matthias Schnürer, Max-Born-Institut, Max-Born-Straße 2a, 12489 Berlin, Germany. E-mail: schnuerer@mbi-berlin.de
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Advancement of ion acceleration by intense laser pulses is studied with ultra-thin nanometer-thick diamond like carbon and micrometer-thick Titanium target foils. Both investigations aim at optimizing the electron density distribution which is the key for efficient laser driven ion acceleration. While recently found maximum ion energies achieved with ultra-thin foils mark record values micrometer thick foils are flexible in terms of atomic constituents. Electron recirculation is one prerequisite for the validity of a very simple model that can approximate the dependence of ion energies of nanometer-thick targets when all electrons of the irradiated target area interact coherently with the laser pulse and Coherent Acceleration of Ions by Laser pulses (CAIL) becomes dominant. Complementary experiments, an analytical model and particle in cell computer simulations show, that with regard to ultra-short laser pulses (duration ~45 fs at intensities up to 5 × 1019 W/cm2) and a micrometer-thick target foil with higher atomic number a close to linear increase of ion energies manifests in a certain range of laser intensities.

Keywords

Coherent acceleration of ions by laser pulsesLaser ion accelerationRadiation pressureRelativistic laser intensityTarget normal sheath acceleration
Type
Research Article
Information
Laser and Particle Beams , Volume 29 , Issue 4 , December 2011 , pp. 437 - 446
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Andreev, A.A., Steinke, S., Sokollik, T., Schnurer, M., Ter Avetsiyan, S., Platonov, K.Y. & Nickles, P.V. (2009). Optimal ion acceleration from ultrathin foils irradiated by a profiled laser pulse of relativistic intensity. Phys. Plasmas 16, 013103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Andreev, A.A. & Platonov, K.V. (2011). Hybrid model of ion acceleration in laser plasma of flat heterogeneous target. Opt. Spectr. 111, 191–199.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Andreev, A.A., Steinke, S., Schnuerer, M., Henig, A., Nickles, P.V., Platonov, K.Y., Sokolik, T. & Sandner, W. (2010). Hybrid ion acceleration with ultrathin composite foils irradiated by high intensity circularly-polarized laser light. Phys. Plasmas 17, 123111.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Augst, S., Meyerhofer, D.D., Strickland, D. & Chin, S.L. (1991). Laser ionization of noble-gases by coulomb-barrier suppression. J. Opt. Soc. Am. B 8, 858–867.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Badziak, J., Woryna, E., Parys, P., Platonov, K.Y., Jablonski, S., Ryc, L.,Vankov, A.B. & Wolowski, J. (2001). Fast proton generation from ultrashort laser pulse interaction with double-layer foil targets. Phys. Rev. Lett. 87, 215001/1–4.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Badziak, J., Woryna, E., Parys, P., Wolowski, J., Platonov, K.Y. & Vankov, A.B. (2002). Effect of foil target thickness on fast proton generation driven by ultrashort-pulse laser. J. Appl. Phys. 91, 5504–5506.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Badziak, J., Jablonski, S., Parys, P., Szydlowski, A., Fuchs, J.& Mancic, A. (2010). Production of high-intensity proton fluxes by a 2ω Nd:glass laser beam. Laser Part. Beams 28, 575–583.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brenner, C.M., Green, J.S., Robinson, A.P.L., Carroll, D.C., Dromey, B., Foster, P.S., Kar, S., Li, Y.T., Markey, K., Spindloe, C., Streeter, M.J.V., Tolley, M., Wahlström, C.-G., Xu, M.H., Zepf, M., McKenna, P. & Neely, D. (2011). Dependence of laser accelerated protons on laser energy following the interaction of defocused, intense laser pulses with ultra-thin targets. Laser Part. Beams 29, 345–351.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Borghesi, M., Audebert, P., Bulanov, S.V., Cowan, T., Fuchs, J., Gauthier, J.C., Mackinnon, A.J., Patel, P.K., Pretzler, G., Romagnani, L., Schiavi, A., Toncian, T. & Willi, O. (2005). High-intensity laser-plasma interaction studies employing laser-driven proton probes. Laser Part. Beams 23, 291–295.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ceccotti, T., Levy, A., Popescu, H., Reau, F., D'oliveira, P., Monot, P., Geindre, J.P., Lefebvre, E. & Martin, P. (2007). Proton acceleration with high-intensity ultrahigh-contrast laser pulses. Phys. Rev. Lett. 99, 185002.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cowan, T.E., Fuchs, J., Ruhl, H., Kemp, A., Audebert, P., Roth, M., Stephens, R., Barton, I., Blazevic, A., Brambrink, E., Cobble, J., Fernandez, J., Gauthier, J.C., Geissel, M., Hegelich, M., Kaae, J., Karsch, S., Le Sage, G.P., Letzring, S., Manclossi, M., Meyroneinc, S., Newkirk, A., Pepin, H. & Renard-Legalloudec, N. (2004). Ultralow emittance, multi-MeV proton beams from a laser virtual-cathode plasma accelerator. Phys. Rev. Lett. 92, 204801.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Esirkepov, T., Yamagiwa, M. & Tajima, T. (2006). Laser ion-acceleration scaling laws seen in multiparametric particle-in-cell simulations. Phys. Rev. Lett. 96, 105001.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Flacco, A., Cecotti, T., George, H., Monot, P., Martin, Ph., Réau, F.,Tscherbakoff, O., D'Oliveira, P., Sylla, F., Veltcheva, M., Burgy, F., Tafzi, A.,Malka, V. & Batani, D. (2010). Comparative study of laser ion acceleration with different contrast enhancement techniques. Nucl. Instrum. Meth. Phys. Res. A 620, 18–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hatchett, S.P., Brown, C.G., Cowan, T.E., Henry, E.A., Johnson, J.S., Key, M.H., Koch, J.A., Langdon, A.B., Lasinski, B.F., Lee, R.W., Mackinnon, A.J., Pennington, D.M., Perry, M.D., Phillips, T.W., Roth, M., Sangster, T.C., Singh, M.S., Snavely, R.A., Stoyer, M.A., Wilks, S.C. & Yasuike, K. (2000). Electron, photon, and ion beams from the relativistic interaction of Petawatt laser pulses with solid targets. Phys. Plasmas 7, 2076–2082.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Henig, A., Kiefer, D., Markey, K., Gauthier, D.C., Flippo, K.A., Letzring, S., Johnson, R.P., Shimada, T., Yin, L., Albright, B.J., Bowers, K.J., Fernandez, J.C., Rykovanov, S.G., Wu, W.C., Zepf, M., Jung, D., Liechtenstein, V.Kh., Schreiber, J., Habs, D. & Hegelich, B.M. (2009 a). Enhanced laser-driven ion acceleration in the relativistic transparency regime. Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 045002.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Henig, A., Steinke, S., Schnurer, M., Sokollik, T., Horlein, R., Kiefer, D., Jung, D., Schreiber, J., Hegelich, B.M., Yan, X.Q., Meyer-Ter-Vehn, J., Tajima, T., Nickles, P.V., Sandner, W. & Habs, D. (2009 b). Radiation-pressure acceleration of ion beams driven by circularly polarized laser pulses. Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 245003.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kaluza, M., Schreiber, J., Santala, M.I.K., Tsakiris, G.D., Eidmann, K., Meyer-Ter-Vehn, J. & Witte, K.J. (2004). Influence of the laser prepulse on proton acceleration in thin-foil experiments. Phys. Rev. Lett. 93, 045003.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kiefer, D., Henig, A., Jung, D., Gautier, D.C., Flippo, K.A., Gaillard, S.A., Letzring, S., Johnson, R., Shah, R.C., Shimada, T., Fernández, J.C., Liechtenstein, V.Kh., Schreiber, J., Hegelich, B.M. & Habs, D. (2009). First observation of quasi-monoenergetic electron bunches driven out of ultra-thin diamond-like carbon (DLC) foils. Euro. Phys. J. D 55, 427.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Klimo, O., Psikal, J., Limpouch, J. & Tikhonchuk, V.T. (2008). Monoenergetic ion beams from ultrathin foils irradiated by ultrahigh-contrast circularly polarized laser pulses. Phys. Rev. 11, 031301.Google Scholar
Kraft, S.D., Richter, C., Zeil, K., Baumann, M., Beyreuther, E., Bock, S., Busmann, M., Cowan, T.E., Dammene, Y., Enghardt, W., Helbig, U., Karsch, L.Kluge, T., Laschinsky, L., Lessmann, E., Metzkes, J., Naumburger, D., Sauerbrey, R., Schürer, M., Sobiella, M., Woithe, J., Schramm, U. & Pawelke, J. (2010). Dose-dependent biological damage of tumor cells by laser-accelerated proton beams. New J. Phys. 12, 085003.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Levy, A., Ceccotti, T., D'oliveira, P., Reau, F., Perdrix, M., Quere, F., Monot, P., Bougeard, M., Lagadec, H., Martin, P., Geindre, J.P. & Audebert, P. (2007). Double plasma mirror for ultrahigh temporal contrast ultraintense laser pulses. Opt. Lett. 32, 310–312.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lundh, O., Lindau, F., Persson, A., Wahlstrom, C.G., Mckenna, P. & Batani, D. (2007). Influence of shock waves on laser-driven proton acceleration. Phys. Rev. E 76, 26404.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
MaCchi, A., Veghini, S. & Pegoraro, F. (2009). “Light sail” acceleration reexamined. Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 085003.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
MaCchi, A., Veghini, S., Liseykina, T.V. & Pegoraro, F. (2009). Radiation pressure acceleration of ultrathin foils. New J. Phys. 12, 045013.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mackinnon, A.J., Patel, P.K., Town, R.P., Edwards, M.J., Phillips, T., Lerner, S.C., Price, D.W., Hicks, D., Key, M.H., Hatchett, S., Wilks, S.C., Borghesi, M., Romagnani, L., Kar, S., Toncian, T., Pretzler, G., Willi, O., Koenig, M., Martinolli, E., Lepape, S., Benuzzi-Mounaix, A., Audebert, P., Gauthier, J.C., King, J., Snavely, R., Freeman, R.R. & Boehlly, T. (2004). Proton radiography as an electromagnetic field and density perturbation diagnostic (invited). Rev. Sci. Instr. 75, 3531–3536.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mckenna, P., Carroll, D.C., Lundh, O., Nürnberg, F., Markev, K., Bandyopadhyay, S., Batani, D., Evans, R.G., Jafer, R., Kar, S., Neely, D., Pepler, D., Quinn, M.N., Redaelli, R., Roth, M., Wahlström, C.G., Yuan, X.H. & Zepf, M. (2008). Effects of front surface plasma expansion on proton acceleration in ultraintense laser irradiation of foil targets. Laser Part. Beams 26, 591–596.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neely, D., Foster, P., Robinson, A., Lindau, F., Lundh, O., Persson, A., Wahlstrom, C.G. & Mckenna, P. (2006). Enhanced proton beams from ultrathin targets driven by high contrast laser pulses. Appl. Phys. Lett. 89, 021502.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nickles, P.V., Schnurer, M., Sokollik, T., Ter-Avetisyan, S., Sandner, W., Amin, M., Toncian, T., Willi, O. & Andreev, A. (2008). Ultrafast laser-driven proton sources and dynamic proton imaging. J. Opt. Soc. Am. B 25, B155–B160.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pae, K.H., Choi, I. W. & Lee, J. (2011). Effect of target composition on proton acceleration by intense laser pulses in the radiation pressure regime, Laser Part. Beams 29, 11–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Prasad, R., Ter-Avetisyan, S., Doria, D., Quinn, K.E., Romagnani, L, Foster, P.S., Brenner, C.M., Green, J.S., Gallegos, P, Streeter, M.J.V., Carroll, D.C., Tresca, O., Dover, N.P., Palmer, C.A.J., Schreiber, J., Neely, D., Najmudin, Z., Mckenna, P., Zepf, M. & Borghesi, M. (2011). Proton acceleration using 50 fs, high intensity ASTRA-Gemini laser pulses, Nucl. Instrum. Phys. Res. A doi:10.1016/j.nima.2011.01.021.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Romagnani, L., Fuchs, J., Borghesi, M., Antici, P., Audebert, P., Ceccherini, F., Cowan, T., Grismayer, T., Kar, S., Macchi, A., Mora, P., Pretzler, G., Schiavi, A., Toncian, T. & Willi, O. (2005). Dynamics of electric fields driving the laser acceleration of multi-MeV protons. Phys. Rev. Lett. 95, 195001.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Schnurer, M., Ter-Avetisyan, S., Busch, S., Risse, E., Kalachnikov, M.P., Sandner, W. & Nickles, P. (2005). Ion acceleration with ultrafast laser driven water droplets. Laser Part. Beams 23, 337–343.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schreiber, J., Bell, F., Grüner, F., Schramm, U., Geissler, M., Schnürer, M., Ter-Avetisyan, S., Hegelich, B.M, Cobble, J., Brambrink, E., Fuchs, J., Audebert, P. & Habs, D. (2006). Analytical model for ion acceleration by high-intensity laser pulses. Phys. Rev. Lett. 97, 045005.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sokollik, T., Schnurer, M., Steinke, S., Nickles, P.V., Sandner, W., Amin, M., Toncian, T., Willi, O. & Andreev, A.A. (2009). Directional laser-driven ion acceleration from microspheres. Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 135003.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sokollik, T., Paasch-Colberg, , Gorling, K., Eichmann, U., Schnurer, M., Steinke, S., Nickles, P.V., Andreev, A.A. & Sandner, W. (2010). Laser driven ion acceleration using mass-limited targets. New J. Phys. 12, 113013.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steinke, S., Henig, A., Schnurer, M., Sokollik, T., Nickles, P.V., Jung, D., Kiefer, D., Horlein, R., Schreiber, J., Tajima, T., Yan, X.Q., Hegelich, M., Meyer-Ter-Vehn, J., Sandner, W. & Habs, D. (2010). Efficient ion acceleration by collective laser-driven electron dynamics with ultra-thin foil targets. Laser Part. Beams 28, 215–221.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steinke, S., Schnurer, M., Sokollik, T., Andreev, A.A., Nickles, P.V., Henig, A., Horlein, R., Kiefer, D., Jung, D., Schreiber, J., Tajima, T., Hegelich, M., Habs, D. & Sandner, W. (2011). Optimization of laser-generated ion beams. Conrib. Plasma Phys. 51, 444–450.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tajima, T., Habs, D. & Yan, X.Q. (2009). Laser acceleration of ions for radiation therapy. Rev. Acc. Sci. Technol. 2, 201–228.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ter-Avetisyan, S., Schnurer, M. & Nickles, P.V. (2005). Time resolved corpuscular diagnostics of plasmas produced with high-intensity femtosecond laser pulses. J. Phys. D 38, 863–867.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Torrisi, L., Caridi, F. & Giuffrida, L. (2011). Protons and ion acceleration from thick targets at 1010 W/cm2 laser pulse intensity. Laser Part. Beams 29, 29–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weichsel, J., Fuchs, T., Lefebvre, E., D'humieres, E. & Oelfke, U. (2008). Spectral features of laser-accelerated protons for radiotherapy applications. Phys. Med. Bio. 53, 4383–4397.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Willingale, L., Nilson, P.M., Kaluza, M.C., Dangor, A.E., Evans, R.G., Fernandes, P., Haines, M.G., Kamperidis, C., Kingham, R.J., Ridgers, C.P., Sherlock, M., Thomas, A.G.R., Wei, M.S., Najmudin, Z., Krushelnick, K., Bandyopadhyay, S., Notley, M., Minardi, S., Tatarakis, M. & Rozmus, W. (2010). Proton deflectometry of a magnetic reconnection geometry. Phys. Plasmas 17, 043104.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yan, X.Q., Lin, C., Sheng, Z.M., Guo, Z.Y., Liu, B.C., Lu, Y.R., Fang, J.X. & Chen, J.E. (2008). Generating high-current monoenergetic proton beams by a circularly polarized laser pulse in the phase-stable acceleration regime. Phys. Rev. Lett 100, 135003.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Yan, X.Q., Tajima, T., Hegelich, M., Yin, L. & Habs, D. (2010). Theory of laser ion acceleration from a foil target of nanometer thickness. Appl. Phys. B 98, 711–721.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zeil, K., Kraft, S.D., Bock, S., Bussmann, M., Cowan, T.E., Kluge, T., Metzkes, J., Richter, T., Sauerbrey, R. & Schramm, U. (2010). The scaling of proton energies in ultrashort pulse laser plasma acceleration. New J. Phys. 12, 045015.CrossRefGoogle Scholar