The project is concerned with highly ionized plasmas produced by intense, short-pulse laser irradiation. It has two major objectives which are pursued in separate sub-projects:

a) The part on relativistic plasma dynamics focuses on the investigation of laser driven ion and proton acceleration. The primary goal is the detailed study of energy transfer processes in relativistic plasmas which are accompanied by strong fields. These fields account for laser acceleration of charged particles which can be pursued for new technologies in pulsed electron and ion beam generation.

The optimization and exploration of different regimes of the laser acceleration process is one objective. In this regard utilization of the laser radiation pressure is a hot topic: cf. Highlights

The method of “proton imaging” is a main diagnostic tool for these investigations. This method allows to identify field geometries which account for directional ion beam generation: cf. Highlights

b) The second part is concerned with research on compact (table-top) plasma based X-ray lasers (XRL), working in the extreme ultraviolett (EUV)-region between 10 and 40 nm. Laboratory based XRL exhibit a broad application potential in material sciences, imaging, spectroscopy and laser plasma diagnostics if two main issues are solved: a stable, well defined output of the system and a high repetition rate for fast data acquisition. This objective will be realized with a XRL user station at MBI. This project is based upon a specific pump laser development in project 1.02 - Thin Disk Laser and collaborative research: cf. Highlights

2. Subprojects and collaborations

UP1: Investigation of relativistic laser plasmas - Ion acceleration and MeV-proton beam imaging

Collaborations:

Univ. Düsseldorf, Univ. Jena, LMU München, MPQ Garching: Joint projects within the national TRANSREGIO TR18 project supported by the DFG;
Prof. Andreev, from 2009-2010 at MBI (Marie-Curie Grant No.PIIF-GA-2008-221727), home institution:Vavilov State Optical Institute,
St. Petersburg, Russia, plasma theory;
Dr. T. Nakamura, ILE Osaka, Japan Prof. Tikhonchuk, CELIA, Université Bordeaux 1, France, plasma theory ; Prof. Ruhl, LMU - München, plasma theory.

UP2: Coherent EUV-radiation from plasma based X-ray lasers (XRL) and its application

Collaborations:

Prof. K.A. Janulewicz, APRI, Gwangju/Korea: Optimization of XRL pumping schemes
Dr. Chul Min, APRI, Gwangju/Korea: Theory on seeded XRL
Prof. S. Eisebitt, TU Berlin: Coherent diffraction imaging using EUV-radiation from XRL
LaserLab Europe, JRA5: Sources of Femtosecond ultra-INtense X-rays (SFINX)
Berlin Laboratory for Innovative X-Ray Technologies (BLiX)