Mechanism of heating of pre-formed plasma electrons in relativistic laser-matter interaction

The role of the longitudinal ambipolar electric field, present inside a pre-formed plasma, in electron heating and beam generation is investigated by analyzing single electron motion in the presence of one electromagnetic plane wave and “V” shaped potential well (constant electric field) in a one di...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Physics of plasmas 2012-06, Vol.19 (6)
Main Authors: Paradkar, B. S., Krasheninnikov, S. I., Beg, F. N.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
ELECTRIC FIELDS
ELECTRON BEAMS
INTERACTIONS
LASERS
ONE-DIMENSIONAL CALCULATIONS
PARTICLE ACCELERATORS
PLASMA
PONDEROMOTIVE FORCE
POTENTIALS
RELATIVISTIC RANGE
SLABS
STOCHASTIC PROCESSES
WAVE PROPAGATION
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Summary:The role of the longitudinal ambipolar electric field, present inside a pre-formed plasma, in electron heating and beam generation is investigated by analyzing single electron motion in the presence of one electromagnetic plane wave and “V” shaped potential well (constant electric field) in a one dimensional slab approximation. It is shown that for the electron confined in an infinite potential well, its motion becomes stochastic when the ratio of normalized laser electric field a0, to normalized longitudinal electric field Ez, exceeds unity, i.e., a0/Ez≳1. For a more realistic potential well of finite depth, present inside the pre-formed plasma, the condition for stochastic heating of electrons gets modified to 1≲a0/Ez≲L, where L is the normalized length of the potential well. The energy of electron beam leaving such a potential well and entering the solid scales ∼a02/Ez, which can exceed the laser ponderomotive energy (∼a0) in the stochastic regime.
ISSN:1070-664X
1089-7674
DOI:10.1063/1.4731731