Speaker
Description
High-energy, repetition-rated ultrashort-pulse lasers at extended wavelengths are of interest for LWFA because ponderomotive forces scale favorably with wavelength. Midwave infrared (MWIR) and longwave infrared (LWIR) laser-based staged laser wakefield accelerator systems could enable steeper acceleration gradients, reducing footprint, complexity, and energy consumption. However, MWIR and LWIR sources have historically been limited to microjoule output energies in architectures that do not readily scale to the high average powers required for LWFA. One promising approach is to pair long-wavelength nonlinear crystals with newly developed 2 micron pump lasers that operate near the upper limit of their pumpable range. This strategy was highlighted in the 2024 Basic Research Needs report for lasers, and we now present proof-of-principle experiments demonstrating its feasibility. Specifically, we pumped anti-reflection-coated ZGP and BGSe crystals with a Tm:YLF pump at 1.88 microns in an OPA configuration, seeded with 2.3 micron light, to generate over 300 microjoules of 10 micron output. Higher energies are expected with improved pump-signal pulse-duration matching and better crystal quality. Ongoing work will address these limitations and explore applications to CO2 amplifier seed lasers. This work demonstrates a path toward efficient, high-average-power MWIR and LWIR systems for laser-plasma science applications.
Prepared by LLNL under Contract DE-AC52-07NA27344. LLNL-ABS-2020639
| Working group | WG1 |
|---|