Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 March 2009
Emissions from the rear side of the targets were temporally resolved by irradiating an ultraviolet (UV) laser on Al and Au thin targets. A difference was clearly observed between the above two targets. Given the fact that absorbed laser energy is converted with a very high efficiency to soft x-rays in a high Z plasma, a characteristic emission peak only observed for Au targets was attributed to the effect of soft x-ray energy transport. The ablation pressures estimated from the emissions indicate that the pressure scaling for Au is close to the one by x-ray radiation rather than by a UV laser. With soft x-ray irradiation, energy transport in A1 foils was also studied. An ablation pressure was estimated by the shock speed.