Spectroscopic characterization of an ultrashort-pulse-laser-driven Ar cluster target incorporating both Boltzmann and particle-in-cell models

Sherrill, M. E.*; Abdallah, J. Jr.*; Csanak, G.*; Dodd, E. S.*; Fukuda, Yuji; Akahane, Yutaka; Aoyama, Makoto; Inoue, Norihiro*; Ueda, Hideki*; Yamakawa, Koichi; Faenov, A. Y.*; Magunov, A. I.*; Pikuz, T. A.*; Skobelev, I. Y.*

A model that solves simultaneously both the electron and atomic kinetics was used to generate synthetic He X-ray spectra to characterize a high intensity ultrashort laser driven Ar cluster target experiment. In particular, level populations were obtained from a detailed collisional-radiative model where collisional rates were computed from a time varying electron distribution function obtained from the solution of the zero dimensional Boltzmann equation. In addition, aparticle-in-cell simulation was used to model the laser interaction with the cluster target and provided the initial electron energy distribution function (EEDF) for the Boltzmann solver. This study suggests that the high density plasma contribution to the time-integrated He spectrum was in a highly non-equilibrium state in both the EEDF and the ion level populations and provides a prediction of 5.7 ps for the average cluster integrity time for this high density state.