Institut National De La Recherche Scientifique

University of Saskatchewan

Ecole Polytechnique Paris Tech

Kieffer, Jean-claude

Jean-Claude Kieffer

Sylvain Fourmaux

Stéphane Payeur

Philippe Lassonde

Jacques Dubois

Gérard Mourou

François Légaré

Alexander Sergeev

Stephane Payeur

Francis Théberge

Marc Chàteauneuf

Emil Hallin

Efim Khazanov

Michel Piche

Jean-Philippe MacLean

Sergey Mironov

Christopher Tchervenkov

Andrzej Krol

Gerard Mourou

A method and a system, the system, comprising a laser source, a ionization and acceleration unit, a separation unit, and a collecting unit, wherein the laser source comprises a large bandwidth laser delivering successive pulses of fixed central wavelength and bandwidth to a surface of a target positioned inside the ionization and acceleration unit, surface atoms of the target being ionized by the pulses, accelerated from the surface of the target to a kinetic energy in the range between 100 eV and 10 KeV, and focused to the separation unit, the separation unit separating received atoms into different ions species, and the collecting unit separately collecting the different ion species. The method comprises positioning a target inside a resistive tube, delivering successive pulses of same selected wavelength and bandwidth from a large bandwidth laser generating a beam of fixed central wavelength and bandwidth to a surface of the target to ionize atoms of the surface of the target, accelerate the ionized atoms to a kinetic energy in a range between 100 eV and 10 KeV, under an electric field in a resistive tube, directing the ionized atoms to a magnetic separator, and collecting ions species of the target separately in cup collectors.

Optical system and method for metallurgical extraction and refining

A system for laser-driven propulsion, system comprising a laser source and a target comprising an accelerating part and a projectile part, the accelerating part comprising a metal layer and a porous layer pressed against the metal layer; wherein the laser source is selected to emit pulse beams directed to the metal layer at a fluence below the plasma ablation threshold of the material of the metal layer.

System for laser-driven impact acceleration

A method and a system for measurement of high laser field intensity, the method comprising tight focusing a non-Gaussian azimuthally polarized laser mode beam to a focusing spot, measuring a spectral line shape of a selected ionization state induced by a longitudinal oscillating magnetic field created by the tight focusing in the focusing spot; and determining the laser intensity from the spectral line shape. The system comprises a laser source of a peak power in a range between 100 terawatt and 10 petawatt; a converter unit; a tight focusing optics; and spectral measurement means; wherein the converter unit polarizes a main laser beam from the laser source into a non-Gaussian azimuthally polarized laser mode beam; the tight focusing optics focuses the azimuthally polarized laser mode beam to a focusing spot, yielding a longitudinal oscillating magnetic field of an intensity proportional to the laser intensity, the spectral measurement means measuring a line shape of a selected ionization state induced by the longitudinal oscillating magnetic field in focusing spot.

Method and system for measurement of ultra-high laser intensity

A X-ray source, comprising a laser, of a pulse duration of at most 40 fs, instantaneous power of at least about 80 TW, a pulse repetition rate of at least 1 Hz; an optical compressor spectrally shaping the laser beam; focusing optics in the range between f#10 and f#15; and a gas target of electron density after ionization by the laser beam in a range between 10cmand 10cm; wherein the focusing optics focuses the laser beam in the gas target, and interaction of the focused laser beam with the gas target generates an X-ray beam, with a focused laser amplitude a, given by a=0.855 [I(10W/cm)&#x3bb;,(&#x3bc;m)], where Iis the on-target laser intensity and &#x3bb;is the laser wavelength, of at least 2 and a P/Pratio value of at least 20, with P being the beam power and Pc a critical power given by Pc=17 (n/n) GW where n is the electron density and nis a critical electron density at which the plasma acts as a mirror reflecting the laser beam.

Method and system of laser-driven intense x-ray photons imaging

A system and a method for laser-driven propulsion, comprising transferring momentum to a projectile through a low-density material at laser fluences below plasma ablation threshold, the method comprising providing a metal layer having a first surface and a second opposite surface; providing a low density layer having a first surface and a second opposite surface; positioning the low density layer with the first surface thereof in direct contact with the second surface of the metal layer; positioning a projectile on the second surface of the low density layer; and heating the metal layer with laser pulses to temperatures below the liquefaction and ionization thresholds of the metal.

Method and system of laser-driven impact acceleration

A method and a system for laser pulse wavefront correction and focusing optimization for laser Wakefield interaction to accelerate electrons to high energy, and more generally for laser matter interaction where both far field and intermediate field optimization are important, allowing a robust wavefront correction and focusing optimization with a high-power laser system at its nominal laser pulse energy and laser pulse duration. The method comprises, after laser beam focusing by focusing optics, coupling an imaging unit to a wavefront sensor, thereby measuring the laser beam wavefront, and adjusting the measured laser beam wavefront to converge to a reference wavefront of the imaging unit using a spatial phase-modifying device.

System and method for correcting laser beam wavefront of high power laser systems

A system comprising a laser emitting an ultrashort pulse beam; and a dielectric bulk medium having a refractive index depending on intensity, the bulk medium broadening the laser beam homogeneously versus transversal spatial coordinates, and a method for compressing high energy femtosecond laser pulses, comprising propagating the laser beam inside a dielectric bulk medium having a refractive index depending on the beam intensity, the bulk medium broadening the laser beam homogeneously versus transversal spatial coordinates; and compressing a resulting broadened spectrum.

System and method for high-intensity ultrashort pulse compression

A method comprising using a pulse shaper in the spectral domain to generate multiple-color pulses directly at the output of the laser amplifier. The delay can thus be controlled directly in the spectral domain and there is no need for an optical delay line. The method allows reducing the number of optical components and insures insensitivity to alignment, vibrations and turbulence on long distance propagation and filamentation, particularly in air. The method allows programmable and tunable interaction, since the pulse shaper is able to control the laser spectral amplitude and phase.

System and method for agile remote generation of a broadband tunable short-pulse emission

A method for generating an ultrashort charged particle beam, comprising creating a high intensity longitudinal E-field by shaping and tightly focusing, in an on-axis geometry, a substantially radially polarized laser beam, and using the high intensity longitudinal E-field for interaction with a medium to accelerate charged particles.

Growing community of inventors

Montreal, Canada

Jean-Claude Kieffer