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The PHELIX High Energy Laser Facility

This article provides an overview of the PHELIX High Energy Laser Facility, including its experimental areas, recent improvements, and representative experimental results. The facility has made significant progress in ion stopping, particle acceleration, and X-ray laser development. It also discusses recent improvements in adjustable pulse length, intensity contrast, and wavefront correction. The article concludes with a summary of the facility's impact on scientific research and future upgrade plans.

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The PHELIX High Energy Laser Facility

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  1. The PHELIX High Energy Laser Facility J. Fils for the PHELIX team GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt, Germany Sept. 27 2010 Speyer EMMI Workshop

  2. Overview

  3. Schematic view of the PHELIX facility Z6 experimental area Heavy ions Faraday Isolator Main Amplifier Sensor Double-pass 31.5 cm amplifier 70 m sensor Target Chamber Switch Yard Compressor Target chamber fs Front End X-ray Lab (low energy) Pre-amplifier 2 x 19 mm heads 1 x 45 mm head TW compressor Fiber ns Front End Injection box Laser Bay Areas recently improved

  4. Performance of PHELIX in 2010 * with use of the adaptive optics

  5. A selection of representative experimental results • Progress in ion stopping (Courtesy of A. Frank) • PHELIX together with nhelix yields significant improvement in quality of experimental data. • Progress in particle acceleration (Courtesy of K. Harres) • Up to 14 MeV protons were collimated using a coil • Progress in X-ray laser development (Courtesy of D. Zimmer) • The DGRIP scheme achieves lasing at 7.26 nm with as little as 30 J of pump laser energy. 6. 8 MeV 9.0 MeV reference Stack located 405 mm from the target Converging proton beams

  6. Status &Recent Improvementsof the Facility

  7. Adjustable pulse length and improved intensity contrast 1 Shot 525 Intensity (normalized) 0.5 5.9 nm 0 1050 1055 1060 Wavelength (nm) • Modified pulse stretcher for adjustable pulse duration control • Spectral width enhanced by use of a birefringent filter 0 10 -2 10 -4 10 • A series of 4 Pockels cells distributed in the font end avoids pre-pulses intensity (normalized) -6 10 ASE level -8 10 -10 10 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 Time (ns)

  8. Main amplifier with energies in the kilojoule range 1000 17.5 kV 900 800 700 600 17 kV 500 Output energy (J) 16.5 kV 400 16 kV 300 200 100 0 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Pre/amplifier energy (J) With a gain of up to 100 (17.5 kV), the main amplifier works as expected, only limited by the damage threshold of the Faraday rotator

  9. Direct on-shot measurement of the pulse duration 1 0.8 Fourier transform limit measurement 0.6 0.4 0.2 0 -2000 0 2000 time delay (fs) • A single-shot autocorrelator is used for alignment and on-shot measurements Shot 1071 Together with a twofold increase in energy, we plan to upgrade the peak power to more than 750 TW in 2010

  10. Active wavefront correction Incoming pulse (distorted wavefront) Deformable mirror Wavefront sensor Outgoing pulse (corrected wavefront)

  11. Active wavefront correction • Three types of aberrations are being found in a complex laser system

  12. Active wavefront correction On-shot aberrations at pre-amplifier level reduced by 60% Waiting time between pre-amplifier shots reduced from 10 down to 3 minutes Increase of main-amplifier repetition rate to 1 shot/hour. without correction with correction

  13. We plan to improve the contrast by use of an ultrafast OPA • ASE is mostly created in the front-end because of low power available from the oscillator • Boost this power using an ultrafast optical parametric amplifier • A gain in contrast of 105 expected • Low pre-pulse level • Higher energy stability because of diode-pumped amplifier Signal 300 µJ 1040 nm, 100 ps 1054 nm 100 fs Ampli. Yb:KYW Freq. shifter Comp. Stretch. SHG Mira Stretch. × 10 OPA 2 nJ 1 ps This development is done within the frame of the Helmholtz Institut Jena (HIJ)

  14. Extension of the experimental capabilities at Z6 2ω beam line (in preparation) PHELIX beam 100 TW beam line (in preparation) Ion beam 10° beam line (in operation) target chamber

  15. Summary PHELIX celebrates 2 years of operation • PHELIX delivered more than 100 shifts in 2009, in line with the prediction • The facility delivered its 2000th documented shot. • An internal beamtime allowed to test the amplifier up to 920 J. • PHELIX has a strong impact on the scientific program of GSI. • Significant results were obtained in ion stopping experiments, manipulation of laser-accelerated particles and coherent X-ray generation • We operate a recent facility which is being constantly improved • PHELIX operates in the ns to sub-ps regime at three different experimental places • Innovative solutions in many locations implemented • Future upgrades are being actively pursued in • contrast improvement (uOPA project) • frequency conversion (2w project) • experimental capability (100 TW project)

  16. Thank you for your attention Picture: G. Otto, GSI

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