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Optimizing laser focal spot size using self-focusing in a cone-guided fast-ignition ICF target

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Abstract

This paper presents a scheme for strong self-focusing of a laser beam interacting with a cone-guided fast-ignition inertial confinement fusion target using cone pre-plasma filling as an optical medium for reducing the laser beam waist. The objective is to reduce the focal spot size at the interior of the tip of the re-entrant cone to that required for efficient coupling to the dense imploded fuel core. This is challenging to achieve in a large laser system using the standard optical components of a chirped-pulse-amplified (CPA) laser-beam chain where the spot sizes produced are often significantly larger than would be desirable for fast ignition. The approach described also makes use of the presence of pre-plasma in the cone. Such pre-plasma filling is difficult to avoid entirely when illuminating a cone with a high-energy CPA laser system due to the challenges of reducing laser pre-pulse to below the threshold for plasma production. For deriving the differential equation which governs the progress of the laser beam-width with propagation distance, paraxial theory in a WKB approximation has been used. A simulation is performed assuming strong self-focusing in accordance with the laser parameters and plasma density profile chosen.

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Acknowledgements

The first author would like to acknowledge the assistance of Mrs. Jyoti Wadhwa from the Department of Physics of the National Institute of Technology, Jalandhar, for assistance with some of the software employed in this study, and Prof. Dieter H.H. Hoffmann of the Institut für Kernphysik, at the Technische Universität Darmstadt for useful discussions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, Lovely Professional University, Phagwara, Punjab, 144411, India

    Oriza Kamboj, Vishal Thakur & Niti Kant

  2. Extreme Light Infrastructure-Nuclear Physics (ELI-NP), “Horia Hulubei” National Institute of Physics and Nuclear Engineering, 30 Reactorului Street, 0077125, Magurele, Jud. Iifov, Romania

    Harjit Singh Ghotra

  3. York Plasma Institute, Department of Physics, University of York, Heslington, York, YO10 5DD, UK

    John Pasley

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  1. Oriza Kamboj
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Correspondence to Niti Kant.

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Kamboj, O., Ghotra, H.S., Thakur, V. et al. Optimizing laser focal spot size using self-focusing in a cone-guided fast-ignition ICF target. Eur. Phys. J. Plus 136, 484 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/s13360-021-01488-8

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