Selective Deuterium Ion Acceleration Using the Vulcan PW Laser

Abstract

We report on the successful demonstration of selective acceleration of deuterium ions by target-normal sheath acceleration (TNSA) with a high-energy petawatt laser. TNSA typically produces a multi-species ion beam that originates from the intrinsic hydrocarbon and water vapor contaminants on the target surface. Using the method first developed by Morrison, et al.,${}^1$ an ion beam with $>$99$\%$ deuterium ions and peak energy 14 MeV/nucleon is produced with a 200 J, 700 fs, $>10^{20}W/c{m}^2$ laser pulse by cryogenically freezing heavy water (D${}_2$O) vapor onto the rear surface of the target prior to the shot. Within the range of our detectors (0-8.5${}^{\circ }$), we find laser-to-deuterium-ion energy conversion efficiency of 4.3$\%$ above 0.7 MeV/nucleon while a conservative estimate of the total beam gives a conversion efficiency of 9.4$\%$.

arXiv comment5 pages, 5 figures

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• Ion acceleration by superintense laser-plasma interaction
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• Ion acceleration in multispecies targets driven by intense laser radiation pressure
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Cited by in corpus (1)

• Nuclear probes of an out-of-equilibrium plasma at the highest compression