High-quality ion beams by irradiating a nano-structured target with a petawatt laser pulse

TL;DR

This paper introduces a new laser-driven ion acceleration method using petawatt laser pulses on nano-structured targets, enabling high-quality, controllable ion beams with potential applications in various fields.

Contribution

The study demonstrates a novel two-step ion acceleration scheme utilizing radiation pressure on nano-structured targets, supported by analytical models and simulations, achieving relativistic proton energies.

Findings

High-quality ion beams with controllable energy and angular dispersion.

Effective two-step acceleration process enabled by radiation pressure.

Relativistic protons achievable with petawatt laser pulses.

Abstract

We present a novel laser based ion acceleration scheme, where a petawatt circularly polarized laser pulse is shot on an ultra-thin (nano-scale) double-layer target. Our scheme allows the production of high-quality light ion beams with both energy and angular dispersion controllable by the target properties. We show that extraction of all electrons from the target by radiation pressure can lead to a very effective two step acceleration process for light ions if the target is designed correctly. Relativistic protons should be obtainable with pulse powers of a few petawatt. Careful analytical modeling yields estimates for characteristic beam parameters and requirements on the laser pulse quality, in excellent agreement with one and two-dimensional Particle-in Cell simulations.