title: Generation of 10(11) contrast 50 TW laser pulses.
abstract: We demonstrate what we believe to be the highest-contrast (10(11)), multiterawatt, chirped-pulse amplification (CPA) Ti:sapphire laser by applying the modified cross-polarized-wave (XPW) generation method. This method produces a contrast improvement of 3 orders of magnitude using microjoule input energy. Microjoule energy can be achieved by direct amplification without the complications of a double CPA system. The 10(11) contrast is sufficient for experiments on high-damage-threshold solid targets with focused intensities up to 10(22) W/cm(2).
authors.affiliation: Center for Ultrafast Optical Sciences, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor 48109-2099, USA. vchv@eecs.umich.edu
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Chvykov
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Rousseau
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Reed
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Kalinchenko
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Yanovsky