Some major petawatt laser projects
| Name | Site | Timetable | Parameters | Web site Link |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Advanced Radiographic Capability | Livermore | 2009 | 10 kJ, 10 ps | |
| Extreme Light Infrastructure | Laboratoire d’Optique Appliquée, France | Proposal | 10 kJ, 10 fs | ELI |
| Firex-1 | ILE, Osaka, Japan | Under construction | 10 kJ, 10 ps | |
| GEKKO Petawatt Module | ILE, Osaka, Japan | In operation | 500 J, 500 fs | |
| Laser Megajoule | University of Bordeaux | Proposal | 2 MJ, 300 ps-10 ns | lmj |
| LULI 2000 | LULI, Paris | Under construction; completion 2006 | 200 J, 400 fs | |
| Omega EP | University of Rochester | 2007 | 2.6 kJ, 1 ps | omegaep |
| Petawatt Laser (original) | Livermore | 1996-1999 | 1.3 kJ, 800 fs | MPerry |
| Phelix | GSI Darmstadt, Germany | Under construction, with heavy-ion beam | 500 J, <500 fs | phelix |
| Polaris | University of Jena, Germany | Development | 120 J, 120 fs | ultraphotonics |
| Texas Petawatt Laser | University of Texas, Austin | Late 2007 | 130 J, 150 fs | petawatt |
| Titan | Livermore | In operation | 400 J, 400 fs or long-pulse | JLF |
| Vulcan Petawatt | Rutherford Appleton Lab, UK | In operation | 400 J, 400 fs | vulcan |
| Z-beamlet | Sandia National Laboratory | Under construction | 2 kJ, 1-10 ps ultimately | z-beamlet |
The first petawatt laser
Livermore’s Petawatt Laser used a chain of Nd:glass lasers from one beam of the Nova fusion laser to amplify nanosecond pulses to the kilojoule range. Pulses were expanded and compressed with high-efficiency 75 cm gratings. Amplifier output of 1.3 kJ in an 800 ps pulse could be compressed down to a 430 fs pulse with peak power of 1.3 PW, which in turn could produce power density approaching 1021 W/cm2. The system generated its first petawatt pulse on May 23, 1996, and ran for three years until Nova was dissembled in 1999.
The Livermore experiments demonstrated the potential of petawatt lasers to concentrate tremendous energies into small volumes, opening a new regime of high-temperature and high-pressure matter for study. The intense fields could accelerate both electrons and positive ions to high velocities over short distances (see www.laserfocusworld.com/articles/252490). Experiments generated bright beams of high-energy x-rays and gamma rays. And Livermore also showed that firing petawatt lasers into a laser-heated fusion target produced a powerful shock wave that helped ignite the fusion fuel.
Second-generation petawatt lasers
The second generation of petawatt lasers is already operating. The Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (Didcot, England) uses a Ti:sapphire oscillator and an optical parametric amplifier to preamplify pulses which then pass through a beam of the lab’s Vulcan Nd:glass laser, and three additional 208 mm Nd:glass disks salvaged from Nova (see Fig. 2). Commissioned in 2002, it initially produced 800 fs pulses with peak power of 500 TW. Further refinements ramped up power, which reached the petawatt level in October 2004, delivering 423 J onto the target in a 410 fs pulse.
Livermore has built a second-generation petawatt laser called Titan around the old two-beam Janus Nd:glass laser used in fusion target experiments back in 1975, says Andrew Ng of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). Overhauled with better glass, the system has two independent beam lines for chirped-pulse amplification and a new generation of pulse-compression gratings. The first experiments in June 2005 generated 400 J in 400 fs to reach petawatt peak power focusable onto an 8 µm spot. It also can operate in long-pulse mode, generating 1 kJ in less than 3 ns or 140 J in 250 ps. Titan can fire long and short pulses simultaneously from its two arms. Ng says that firing long pulses to create a plasma and short pulses to probe the plasma is a very effective way to study high-energy states.
Livermore is also planning a big step up in energy with a second long-pulse system for use with the National Ignition Facility. Called the Advanced Radiographic Capability, it initially will fire 1 kJ pulses to record multiframe x-ray movies of NIF targets, says lead scientist Chris Barty of LLNL. By combining four NIF beams, he hopes to generate 13.2 kJ in a 10 ps pulse. The first beamline is to be commissioned in spring 2009.
Most other systems in operation, construction, or planning stages are either long-pulse systems based on Nd:glass or Ti:sapphire systems generating pulses as short as 20 fs. The main exception is the $15 million Texas Petawatt Laser, which will use parametric amplification to raise the 1 J output of a Ti:sapphire oscillator to 250 J, which they hope to deliver in 150 fs pulses. Project director Todd Ditmire hopes to produce his first petawatt pulses late in 2007.
Laser Focus World August, 2006
Author: Jeff Hecht
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