The role of collisional ionization in heavy ion acceleration by high intensity laser pulses
Masoud Afshari, Stuart Morris, Laura Geulig, Zahra M. Chitgar, P. Gibbon, P. G. Thirolf, J. Schreiber
Abstract
We present here simulation results of the laser-driven acceleration of gold ions using the EPOCH code. Recently, an experiment reported the acceleration of gold ions up to 7 MeV/nucleon with a strong dependency of the charge-state distribution on target thickness and the detection of the highest charge states [Formula: see text]. Our simulations using a developmental branch of EPOCH (4.18-Ionization) show that collisional ionization is the most important cause of charge states beyond Z = 51 up to He-like Au.
Topics & Concepts
IonizationIonAtomic physicsAccelerationPhysicsCharge (physics)LaserNucleonEpoch (astronomy)OpticsAstrophysicsStarsClassical mechanicsQuantum mechanicsLaser-Plasma Interactions and DiagnosticsLaser-induced spectroscopy and plasmaAtomic and Molecular Physics