RESUMO
Thanks to a phase-modulated injection seeder, we report the operation of a nanosecond Nd:YAG Q-switched laser with pulses having both a large spectral bandwidth and a smooth temporal waveform. Because of the smooth temporal waveform, such pulses allow, for instance, reducing the impact of the Kerr effect and, because of the large spectral bandwidth, suppressing stimulated Brillouin scattering. We conducted a parametric study of the features of the generated pulses versus the injection conditions. We show that, as opposed to the central frequency (wavelength) of the seeder, the phase modulation frequency has to be carefully chosen, but it is not a critical parameter and does not require any particular feedback.
RESUMO
The anisotropy of the hot-electron velocity distribution in ultra-high-intensity laser produced plasma was studied with x-ray polarization spectroscopy using multilayer planar targets including x-ray emission tracer in the middle layer. This measurement serves as a diagnostic for hot-electron transport from the laser-plasma interaction region to the overdense region where drastic changes in the isotropy of the electron velocity distribution are observed. These polarization degrees are consistent with analysis of a three-dimensional polarization spectroscopy model coupled with particle-in-cell simulations. Electron velocity distribution in the underdense region is affected by the electric field of the laser and that in the overdense region becomes wider with increase in the tracer depth. A full-angular spread in the overdense region of 22.4 degrees -2.4+5.4 was obtained from the measured polarization degree.