title: Bursts of Terahertz Radiation from Large-Scale Plasmas Irradiated by Relativistic Picosecond Laser Pulses.
abstract: Powerful terahertz (THz) radiation is observed from large-scale underdense preplasmas in front of a solid target irradiated obliquely with picosecond relativistic intense laser pulses. The radiation covers an extremely broad spectrum with about 70% of its energy located in the high frequency regime over 10 THz. The pulse energy of the radiation is found to be above 100  μJ per steradian in the laser specular direction at an optimal preplasma scale length around 40-50  μm. Particle-in-cell simulations indicate that the radiation is mainly produced by linear mode conversion from electron plasma waves, which are excited successively via stimulated Raman scattering instability and self-modulated laser wakefields during the laser propagation in the preplasma. This radiation can be used not only as a powerful source for applications, but also as a unique diagnostic of parametric instabilities of laser propagation in plasmas.
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: G Q
authors.initials: GQ
authors.lastname: Liao
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.|IFSA Collaborative Innovation Center, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China.
authors.forename: Y T
authors.initials: YT
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: L N
authors.initials: LN
authors.lastname: Su
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zheng
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.|IFSA Collaborative Innovation Center, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China.
authors.forename: W M
authors.initials: WM
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: Z D
authors.initials: ZD
authors.lastname: Hu
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: W C
authors.initials: WC
authors.lastname: Yan
authors.affiliation: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, 7000 East Avenue, Livermore, California 94551, USA.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Dunn
authors.affiliation: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, 7000 East Avenue, Livermore, California 94551, USA.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Nilsen
authors.affiliation: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, 7000 East Avenue, Livermore, California 94551, USA.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hunter
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory for Laser Plasmas (MoE) and Department of Physics and Astronomy, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China.
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: X
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.|IFSA Collaborative Innovation Center, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China.
authors.forename: L M
authors.initials: LM
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: J L
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.affiliation: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: X
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Lu
authors.affiliation: Photon Pioneers Center, Osaka University, 2-1 Yamada-oka, Suita, Osaka, 565-0871, Japan.
authors.forename: Z
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Jin
authors.affiliation: Photon Pioneers Center, Osaka University, 2-1 Yamada-oka, Suita, Osaka, 565-0871, Japan.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Kodama
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory for Laser Plasmas (MoE) and Department of Physics and Astronomy, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China.|IFSA Collaborative Innovation Center, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China.|SUPA, Department of Physics, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow G4 0NG, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Z M
authors.initials: ZM
authors.lastname: Sheng
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory for Laser Plasmas (MoE) and Department of Physics and Astronomy, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China.|IFSA Collaborative Innovation Center, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Zhang