Amplification and generation of ultra-intense twisted laser pulses via stimulated Raman scattering

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates theoretically and through simulations that stimulated Raman backscattering can generate and amplify ultra-intense twisted laser pulses with orbital angular momentum in plasmas, opening new avenues in high energy density science.

Contribution

It introduces a novel method to produce and amplify ultra-intense twisted laser pulses using stimulated Raman scattering, combining theoretical analysis and 3D simulations.

Findings

Twisted laser pulses can be amplified to Petawatt intensities in plasma.

Stimulated Raman backscattering effectively generates high-intensity twisted light.

Potential applications include advanced plasma accelerators and non-linear optics.

Abstract

Twisted Laguerre-Gaussian lasers, with orbital angular momentum and characterised by doughnut shaped intensity profiles, provide a transformative set of tools and research directions in a growing range of fields and applications, from super-resolution microcopy and ultra-fast optical communications to quantum computing and astrophysics. The impact of twisted light is widening as recent numerical calculations provided solutions to long-standing challenges in plasma-based acceleration by allowing for high gradient positron acceleration. The production of ultrahigh intensity twisted laser pulses could then also have a broad influence on relativistic laser-matter interactions. Here we show theoretically and with ab-initio three-dimensional particle-in-cell simulations, that stimulated Raman backscattering can generate and amplify twisted lasers to Petawatt intensities in plasmas. This work may open new research directions in non-linear optics and high energy density science, compact plasma based accelerators and light sources.