TY  - GEN
AB  - Ultra-intense lasers that ionize atoms and accelerate electrons in solids to near the speed of light can lead to kinetic instabilities that alter the laser absorption and subsequent electron transport, isochoric heating, and ion acceleration. These instabilities can be difficult to characterize, but X-ray scattering at keV photon energies allows for their visualization with femtosecond temporal resolution on the few nanometer mesoscale. Here, we perform such experiment on laser-driven flat silicon membranes that shows the development of structure with a dominant scale of 60 nm in the plane of the laser axis and laser polarization, and 95 nm in the vertical direction with a growth rate faster than 0.1 fs⁻¹. Combining the XFEL experiments with simulations provides a complete picture of the structural evolution of ultra-fast laser-induced plasma density development, indicating the excitation of plasmons and a filamentation instability. Particle-in-cell simulations confirm that these signals are due to an oblique two-stream filamentation instability. These findings provide new insight into ultra-fast instability and heating processes in solids under extreme conditions at the nanometer level with possible implications for laser particle acceleration, inertial confinement fusion, and laboratory astrophysics.
AU  - Ordyna, Paweł
AU  - Bähtz, Carsten
AU  - Brambrink, Erik
AU  - Bussmann, Michael
AU  - Laso Garcia, Alejandro
AU  - Garten, Marco
AU  - Gaus, Lennart
AU  - Göde, Sebastian
AU  - Grenzer, Jörg
AU  - Gutt, Christian
AU  - Höppner, Hauke
AU  - Huang, Lingen
AU  - Hübner, Uwe
AU  - Humphries, Oliver
AU  - Marré, Brian Edward
AU  - Metzkes-Ng, Josefine
AU  - Miethlinger, Thomas
AU  - Nakatsutsumi, Motoaki
AU  - Öztürk, Özgül
AU  - Pan, Xiayun
AU  - Paschke-Brühl, Franziska
AU  - Pelka, Alexander
AU  - Prencipe, Irene
AU  - Preston, Thomas
AU  - Randolph, Lisa
AU  - Schlenvoigt, Hans-Peter
AU  - Schwinkendorf, Jan-Patrick
AU  - Šmíd, Michal
AU  - Starke, Sebastian
AU  - Štefaníková, Radka
AU  - Thiessenhusen, Erik
AU  - Toncian, Toma
AU  - Zeil, Karl
AU  - Schramm, Ulrich
AU  - Cowan, Thomas E.
AU  - Kluge, Thomas
DA  - 2024
DA  - 2024
EP  - 296
ID  - 3857
J1  - Commun. Phys.
JA  - Commun. Phys.
JF  - Communications Physics
L1  - https://xfel.tind.io/record/3857/files/s42005-024-01776-6.pdf
L2  - https://xfel.tind.io/record/3857/files/s42005-024-01776-6.pdf
L4  - https://xfel.tind.io/record/3857/files/s42005-024-01776-6.pdf
LA  - eng
LA  - English
LK  - https://xfel.tind.io/record/3857/files/s42005-024-01776-6.pdf
LK  - https://www.nature.com/articles/s42005-024-01776-6
N2  - Ultra-intense lasers that ionize atoms and accelerate electrons in solids to near the speed of light can lead to kinetic instabilities that alter the laser absorption and subsequent electron transport, isochoric heating, and ion acceleration. These instabilities can be difficult to characterize, but X-ray scattering at keV photon energies allows for their visualization with femtosecond temporal resolution on the few nanometer mesoscale. Here, we perform such experiment on laser-driven flat silicon membranes that shows the development of structure with a dominant scale of 60 nm in the plane of the laser axis and laser polarization, and 95 nm in the vertical direction with a growth rate faster than 0.1 fs⁻¹. Combining the XFEL experiments with simulations provides a complete picture of the structural evolution of ultra-fast laser-induced plasma density development, indicating the excitation of plasmons and a filamentation instability. Particle-in-cell simulations confirm that these signals are due to an oblique two-stream filamentation instability. These findings provide new insight into ultra-fast instability and heating processes in solids under extreme conditions at the nanometer level with possible implications for laser particle acceleration, inertial confinement fusion, and laboratory astrophysics.
PB  - Springer Nature
PY  - 2024
PY  - 2024
SP  - 296
T1  - Visualizing plasmons and ultrafast kinetic instabilities in laser-driven solids using X-ray scattering
TI  - Visualizing plasmons and ultrafast kinetic instabilities in laser-driven solids using X-ray scattering
UR  - https://xfel.tind.io/record/3857/files/s42005-024-01776-6.pdf
UR  - https://www.nature.com/articles/s42005-024-01776-6
VL  - 7
Y1  - 2024
ER  -