1 results
An automated, 0.5 Hz nano-foil target positioning system for intense laser plasma experiments
- Part of
-
- Journal:
- High Power Laser Science and Engineering / Volume 5 / 2017
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 19 June 2017, e12
-
- Article
-
- You have access
- Open access
- HTML
- Export citation
-
We report on a target system supporting automated positioning of nano-targets with a precision resolution of
$4~\unicode[STIX]{x03BC}\text{m}$ in three dimensions. It relies on a confocal distance sensor and a microscope. The system has been commissioned to position nanometer targets with 1 Hz repetition rate. Integrating our prototype into the table-top ATLAS 300 TW-laser system at the Laboratory for Extreme Photonics in Garching, we demonstrate the operation of a 0.5 Hz laser-driven proton source with a shot-to-shot variation of the maximum energy about 27% for a level of confidence of 0.95. The reason of laser shooting experiments operated at 0.5 Hz rather than 1 Hz is because the synchronization between the nano-foil target positioning system and the laser trigger needs to improve.
