Relativistic laser channeling in plasmas for fast ignition

Phys Rev E Stat Nonlin Soft Matter Phys. 2007 Dec;76(6 Pt 2):066403. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevE.76.066403. Epub 2007 Dec 18.

Abstract

We report an experimental observation suggesting plasma channel formation by focusing a relativistic laser pulse into a long-scale-length preformed plasma. The channel direction coincides with the laser axis. Laser light transmittance measurement indicates laser channeling into the high-density plasma with relativistic self-focusing. A three-dimensional particle-in-cell simulation reproduces the plasma channel and reveals that the collimated hot-electron beam is generated along the laser axis in the laser channeling. These findings hold the promising possibility of fast heating a dense fuel plasma with a relativistic laser pulse.