7th International Conference on X-Ray Lasers

J. Phys. IV France 11 (2001) Pr2-165-Pr2-173
DOI: 10.1051/jp4:2001232

Lasing to ground state of ions in discharge created plasma in microcapillary

A. Goltsov¹, A. Morozov², Y. Ping², I. Geltner², S. Suckewer², U. Feldman³, T. Jones³, C. Moore³, J. Seely³, P. Sprangle³, A. Ting³, R. Elton⁴, K. Krushelnik⁵ and A. Zigler<sup>6

1</sup>  Kurchatov Institute, TRINITI, Troitsk, 142092 Moscow Region, Russia
²  Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, U.S.A.
³  Naval Research Laboratory, 4555 Overlook Ave., SW, Washington, DC 20357, U.S.A.
⁴  University of Maryland, College Park, MD 29742-3511, U.S.A.
⁵  Imperial College, London SW7 2BZ, U.K.
⁶  Hebrew University, Jerusalem 91904, Israel

Abstract
The objective of this paper is to present the results of recent experiments on lasing to ground state in H-like LiIII ions in microcapillary plasma. The experiments were conducted at both Princeton University and NRL. Two methods were used to fill the microcapillaries with plasma: ablation of microcapillary walls when irradiated with a low power laser beam of a few ns duration, or fast electrical discharge. Powerful subpicosecond laser beams (with wavelength of [MATH] at Princeton University and [MATH] at NRL) were used for longitudinal pumping of microcapillary plasma following by the fast recombination and gain generation in the transition to ground state of hydrogen-like LiIII ions. In these experiments the dependence of the gain on the specific method of the preplasma creation, electric discharge versus low-power laser, pumping laser wavelength ([MATH] versus [MATH]), and the geometry of the experiment (microcapillary dimensions and electrode design) were investigated. Results of these investigations are presented and discussed with the particular emphasis on the experiments with the 1 µm subpicosecond laser pumping of discharge-produced microcapillary plasma.

© EDP Sciences 2001