Self Modulation and Scattering Instability of a Relativistic Short Laser Pulse in an Underdense Plasma

TL;DR

This paper develops an analytical framework to describe the self-modulation and scattering instability of short intense laser pulses in underdense plasma, supported by simulations, revealing new insights into pulse evolution and instability behaviors.

Contribution

It introduces a self-consistent analytical model for laser pulse evolution in plasma, accounting for self-modulation and instability, with solutions applicable to arbitrary pulse conditions.

Findings

Analytical solutions show envelope evolution driven by spatial frequency-chirp.

Pulse envelope develops fine modulations leading to low-frequency modes.

Instability behaviors vary with pulse shape and intensity, including spectrum broadening and pulse breakup.

Abstract

Characterization of self-consistent laser-plasma evolutions serves as a fundamental issue in the field of relativistic laser-plasma interactions. In this paper, we present an analysis framework for description of these evolutions during propagation of a short intense laser pulse in a sub-critical high-density plasma (the pulse length exceeds the plasma wavelength). In this context, the pulse evolutions are attributed to the wakefield induced self-modulation and destabilization via parametric exponentiation of the initial noise content. The self-consistent plasma evolutions are formulated in terms of quantities which used to be motion constants in the absence of pulse evolutions. This proves very useful both in understanding plasma evolutions during self-modulation and also in facilitating the instability studies in the strongly nonlinear regime, via refinement of unstable plasma perturbations. General analytical solutions, at arbitrary pulse conditions, are derived for self-modulation, indicating that the envelop evolutions are driven by the induced spatial frequency-chirp. Also, these results state that the envelope attains fine modulations which produce long wavelength low-frequency modes via beating the carrier mode. The plasma wave variations are found to convect and amplify away from the pulse front. Regarding parametric instability, we assess different scattering regimes at different pulse shapes and peak intensities, manifesting anomalous behaviors ranging from wild positioning of the Stokes wave in dispersion plane to broadening in the scattered spectrum and halting the instability. Our analyses are assisted and verified by numerous fluid and particle-in-cell simulations. Based on our results, we discuss phenomena like the pulse breakup and its different regimes, and assisted particle acceleration in presence of pulse evolutions.