title: Boron nitride plasma micro lens for high intensity laser pre-pulse suppression.
abstract: We demonstrate that amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) and pre-pulses for high power lasers can be suppressed by propagating the pulse through a boron nitride plasma microlens. The microlens is created by ablating a boron-nitride (BN) disk with a central hole using an Nd:YAG laser . The plasma lens produced in the ablation process exhibits different focal lengths for the high intensity main pulse and low intensity pre-pulse that increases the main pulse/pre-pulse contrast ratio by one order of magnitude while maintaining high transmittance of the pulse energy.
authors.affiliation: Racah Institute of Physics, Hebrew University, Jerusalem 91904, Israel. yiftach.katzir@mail.huji.ac.il
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Katzir
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Ferber
authors.forename: J R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Penano
authors.forename: R F
authors.initials: RF
authors.lastname: Hubbard
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Sprangle
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Zigler
mesh_terms: D000669:Amplifiers, Electronic; D001896:Boron Compounds / Q000737:chemistry*; D004867:Equipment Design; D019544:Equipment Failure Analysis; D007834:Lasers; D007909:Lenses; D058626:Plasma Gases / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D001896:Boron Compounds; D058626:Plasma Gases; C017282:boron nitride