Laser-Driven Rayleigh-Taylor Instability: Plasmonics Effects and Three-Dimensional Structures

Abstract

The acceleration of dense targets driven by the radiation pressure of high-intensity lasers leads to a Rayleigh-Taylor instability (RTI) with rippling of the interaction surface. Using a simple model it is shown that the self-consistent modulation of the radiation pressure caused by a sinusoidal rippling affects substantially the wavevector spectrum of the RTI depending on the laser polarization. The plasmonic enhancement of the local field when the rippling period is close to a laser wavelength sets the dominant RTI scale. The nonlinear evolution is investigated by three dimensional simulations, which show the formation of stable structures with "wallpaper" symmetry.

5 pages, 5 figures. New version includes 2D and 3D simulations. More details in the analytical calculation are given in the previous version

References in corpus (10)

• Ion acceleration by superintense laser-plasma interaction
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• Instability of a Thin Conducting Foil Accelerated by a Finite Wavelength Intense Laser
• Chirped standing wave acceleration of ions with intense lasers
• Rayleigh-Taylor turbulence with singular nonuniform initial conditions
• Radiation Pressure Driven Ion Weibel Instability and Collisionless Shocks
• Observation of ultrafast solid-density plasma dynamics using femtosecond X-ray pulses from a free-electron laser
• Radiation pressure acceleration of high-quality ion beams using ultrashort laser pulses
• Two surface plasmon decay of plasma oscillations
• Energy-chirp compensation of laser-driven ion beams enabled by structured targets
• Simple scaling equations for electron spectra, currents and bulk heating in ultra-intense short-pulse laser-solid interaction
• Design of plasma shutters for improved heavy ion acceleration by ultra-intense laser pulses
• Progress in relativistic laser-plasma interaction with kilotesla-level applied magnetic fields
• On the control of electron heating for optimal laser radiation pressure ion acceleration
• Acceleration and focusing of multispecies ion beam using a converging laser-driven shock
• Probing the dynamics of solid density micro-wire targets after ultra-intense laser irradiation using a free-electron laser
• Radiation pressure acceleration of protons from structured thin-foil targets
• Nanoscale subsurface dynamics of solids upon high-intensity laser irradiation observed by femtosecond grazing-incidence x-ray scattering