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Investigation of Magnetic Vortex Acceleration at BELLA iP2

ORAL

Abstract

The interaction of an ultra-intense laser pulse with a near critical density (NCD) target results in the formation of a plasma channel, a strong azimuthal magnetic field and moving vortices. An application of this is the generation of energetic and collimated ion beams via Magnetic Vortex Acceleration (MVA). An experimental campaign is scheduled to study this regime at iP2, the newly constructed short focal length beamline of the BELLA PW facility. A series of 3D simulations, using the WarpX code, was performed to study the robustness of the MVA mechanism when applying our realistic experimental conditions. Of particular interest is the acceleration performance with different laser temporal contrast conditions, in some cases leading to pre-expanded target profiles prior to the arrival of the main pulse. We studied the pre-plasma effects on the structure of the accelerating fields and performed a detailed analysis of the ion beam properties and the efficiency of the process.

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Publication: S Hakimi, L Obst-Huebl, A Huebl, K Nakamura, S Bulanov, S Steinke, W Leemans, Z Kober, T Ostermayer, T Schenkel, A Gonsalves, J-L Vay, J van Tilborg, C Toth, C Schroeder, E Esarey and C Geddes, "Laser-solid interaction studies enabled by the new capabilities of the iP2 BELLA PW beamline", accepted for publication at Physics of Plasmas (2022)

Presenters

  • Sahel Hakimi

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, ATAP, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab

Authors

  • Sahel Hakimi

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, ATAP, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab

  • Axel Huebl

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

  • Stepan Bulanov

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, LBL

  • Lieselotte Obst-Huebl

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

  • Kei Nakamura

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

  • Tobias Ostermayr

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, ATAP, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab

  • Carl B Schroeder

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

  • Anthony J Gonsalves

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

  • Jeroen V van Tilborg

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, ATAP, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab

  • Jean-Luc Vay

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

  • Eric H Esarey

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

  • Cameron R Geddes

    Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, ATAP, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab