title: Tiled-grating compression of multiterawatt laser pulses.
abstract: High-energy petawatt lasers require large diffraction gratings for pulse compression. As an alternative to meter-sized gratings, we demonstrate the capability of a tiled-grating system to compress multiterawatt subpicosecond laser pulses. Using a 100 TW-class Nd:glass chirped-pulse amplification laser facility, we report on the performance of a two-grating mosaic to compress high-energy pulses to 2.5 J, 450 fs (5.5 TW) in air with a beam size of 50 mm and energy transmission of 63%. Stability of the grating mosaic alignment was realized by use of an accurate nanopositioning optomechanical system. The output Gaussian spectrum was preserved from grating-gap spectral clipping and was free of modulation.
authors.affiliation: Laboratoire pour l'Utilisation des Lasers Intense, Ecole Polytechnique, CNRS, CEA, UPMC, Palaiseau, France. arnaud.cotel@polytechnique.edu
authors.forename: Arnaud
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Cotel
authors.forename: Caroline
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Crotti
authors.forename: Patrick
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Audebert
authors.forename: Catherine
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Le Bris
authors.forename: Catherine
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Le Blanc