Soft x-ray plasma-based seeded multistage amplification chain.
To date, plasma-based soft x-ray lasers have demonstrated experimentally 1 μJ, 1 ps (1 MW) pulses. This Letter reports extensive study using time-dependant Maxwell-Bloch code of seeding millimeter scale plasmas that store more than 100 mJ in population inversion. Direct seeding of these plasmas has to overcome very strong amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) as well as prevent wake-field amplification. Below 100 nJ injected energy, seed produces pulses with picosecond duration. To overcome this limitation, a new scheme has been studied, taking advantage of a plasma preamplifier that dramatically increases the seed energy prior to entering the main plasma amplifier leading to ASE and wake-free, fully coherent 21.6 μJ, 80 fs pulses (0.27 GW).
Laboratoire d’Optique Appliquée, ENSTA ParisTech, École Polytechnique ParisTech, CNRS, UMR 7639 Palaiseau Cedex 91762, France. eduardo.oliva@ensta‑paristech.fr
Eduardo
E
Oliva
Marta
M
Fajardo
Lu
L
Li
Stephane
S
Sebban
David
D
Ros
Philippe
P
Zeitoun
D055620:Optical Phenomena; D058626:Plasma Gases; D014965:X-Rays
D058626:Plasma Gases