High-contrast, high-intensity petawatt-class laser and applications
Kiriyama, Hiromitsu; Mori, Michiaki; Pirozhkov, A. S.; Ogura, Koichi; Sagisaka, Akito; Kon, Akira; Esirkepov, T. Z.; Hayashi, Yukio; Kotaki, Hideyuki; Kanasaki, Masato*; Sakaki, Hironao; Fukuda, Yuji; Koga, J. K.; Nishiuchi, Mamiko; Kando, Masaki; Bulanov, S. V.; Kondo, Kiminori; Bolton, P.; Slezak, O.*; Vojna, D.*; Sawicka-Chyla, M.*; Jambunathan, V.*; Lucianetti, A.*; Mocek, T.*
This paper reviews the development of a high-contrast high-intensity petawatt-class Ti:sapphire chirped-pulse amplification (CPA) laser for research on high field science. We discuss in detail the design, performance and characterization of the laser. We also describe the on-going upgrade of the laser system and some applications for the laser in relativistic dominated laser-matter interactions.