Technologies have advanced to enable novel manipulation of laser light to improve grand challenge applications that require control of laser-plasma interactions. By coupling the laser fields in space and time, short-pulse lasers are being used to generate regions of high-intensity light that propagate at prescribed velocities over long distances,[1] to overcome limitations in laser-plasma accelerators [2], THz production [3], and all-optical x-ray lasers [4]. By creating a spatially coherent, but temporally incoherent laser beam, laser-plasma instabilities in fusion experiments are predicted to be mitigated expanding the hydrodynamic design space to include a path to direct-drive inertial fusion energy. These pulses are enabled by novel advancements in broadband laser amplification and broadband frequency conversion [4], which have led to the Fourth generation Laser for Ultrabroadband eXperiments (FLUX).
This material is based upon work supported by the Department of Energy Office of Fusion Energy under Award Numbers DE-SC0016253, DE-SC0024863 and the National Nuclear Security Administration under Award Number DE-NA0004144.
[1] D. H. Froula et al. Nature Photonics 12, 262-265 (2018)
[2] J. P. Palastro et al. Physical Review Letters 124, 134802 (2020)
[3] J. Pigeon et al. CLEO (2025)
[4] C. Dorrer et al., Opt. Express 28, 451 (2020); C. Dorrer et al., Opt. Express 29, 135 (2021)