Progress in research on high-performance seed sources for 100 petawatt laser devices

[ Instrument network instrument research and development ] Recently, the State Key Laboratory of High Field Laser Physics, Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences has made progress in high-performance seed sources in 100-watt laser devices, using cascaded optical parametric amplification (OPA) technology Produce a high-performance 910nm seed source and apply it to the extreme photophysical line station 100PW laser device of the hard X-ray free electron laser device. Related research results were published in "Optics Letters".

In order to promote frontier major physics research such as strong field physics and vacuum QED, several research institutions have proposed the construction plan of 100 petawatt super-strong and ultra-short laser devices. The extreme photophysical line of the hard X-ray free electron laser device is currently under construction in Zhangjiang, Shanghai The 100PW laser device in the station is the first project to start. The 100-Pw laser device adopts the overall technology of Optical Parametric Chirped Pulse Amplification (OPCPA). As the source of the 100-PW laser system, the seed source part will provide the entire system with high-quality seed pulses with excellent performance in the entire space-time spectrum. Its performance will be directly Influencing the output capacity of the device is of vital importance.

Shanghai Institute of Optics and Mechanics adopts supercontinuum generation combined with femtosecond optical parametric amplification technology, through cascaded optical parametric amplification and precision dispersion control technology to obtain a repetition frequency of 1kHz, a 910nm center wavelength matched with ultra-wideband optical parametric amplification, and higher than 100 microjoules Pulse energy, ultra-wide bandwidth greater than 200nm, pulse width less than 15fs, ultra-high time contrast better than 1012, and excellent spatiotemporal quality output. The comprehensive performance meets the requirements of a 100-PW laser system. At present, the seed source has been put into engineering application, providing the foundation and guarantee for the development of the subsequent system.

Related work has been supported by the National Development and Reform Commission, the Shanghai Development and Reform Commission, the Shanghai-level major project, the Chinese Academy of Sciences Strategic Leading Science and Technology Project, and the National Natural Science Foundation of China.