Soft X-ray emission from laser-irradiated gold foils

This paper reports measurements of soft-x-ray emission from gold foils irradiated by 6 ns laser pulses, and analysis and simulations of the observations. These foils can be used as x-ray sources to drive a wide range of experiments. A multichannel, photodiode array measured the time-resolved, soft-x...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Physics of plasmas 2018-07, Vol.25 (7)
Main Authors: Davis, J. S., Drake, R. P., Fraenkel, M., Frank, Y., Keiter, P. A., Klein, S. R., Raicher, E., Shvarts, D., Trantham, M. R.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
Atomic physics
Computer simulation
Emission analysis
Energy bands
Framing cameras
Gold
Lasers
Metal foils
Monte Carlo simulation
Photodiodes
Plasma physics
Soft x rays
Time dependence
Uncertainty
X ray sources
X-rays
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Summary:This paper reports measurements of soft-x-ray emission from gold foils irradiated by 6 ns laser pulses, and analysis and simulations of the observations. These foils can be used as x-ray sources to drive a wide range of experiments. A multichannel, photodiode array measured the time-resolved, soft-x-ray emission. A soft-x-ray framing camera imaged the emission in selected energy bands. Foil thicknesses were from 0.5 to 1.5 μm. The imaging data show that the region emitting soft x-rays grows throughout the laser drive, on both the front and rear surfaces. Analysis of the emitted radiation flux from the rear surface, taking the time-dependent spot size into account, showed that the peak effective temperature of 0.5-μm-thick foils is near 88 eV, while that of 0.75-μm-thick foils is near 78 eV. A Monte Carlo method was used to evaluate the component of the uncertainty in the effective temperature introduced by variations in signal voltages and by uncertainty in the size of the emitting spot. This was found to be near ±2 eV in most cases. Simple theoretical considerations explain the main features of the observations. The Florence code, working with atomic physics from sophisticated models, proved able to reproduce the main features of the observed spectra with 1D simulations in which the laser energy flux was adjusted on the basis of the observed lateral spreading of energy.
ISSN:1070-664X
1089-7674
DOI:10.1063/1.5036934