Towards laser driven hadron cancer radiotherapy; A Review of progress

Ledingham, K.*; Bolton, P. R.*; Shikazono, Naoya; Ma, C.-M.*

Applied Sciences (Internet), 4(3), p.402 - 443, 2014/09

https://doi.org/10.3390/app4030402

Ion acceleration in subcritical density plasma via interaction of intense laser pulse with cluster-gas target

Fukuda, Yuji; Faenov, A.*; Tampo, Motonobu; Pikuz, T.*; Nakamura, Tatsufumi; Kando, Masaki; Hayashi, Yukio; Yogo, Akifumi; Sakaki, Hironao; Kameshima, Takashi*; et al.

Progress in Ultrafast Intense Laser Science VII, p.225 - 240, 2011/05

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-18327-0_10

We present substantial enhancement of the accelerated ion energies up to 10-20 MeV per nucleon by utilizing the unique properties of the cluster-gas target irradiated with 40-fs laser pulses of only 150 mJ energy, corresponding to approximately tenfold increase in the ion energies compared to previous experiments using thin foil targets. A particle-in-cell simulation infers that the high energy ions are generated at the rear side of the target due to the formation of a strong dipole vortex structure in sub-critical density plasmas. The demonstrated method can be important in the development of efficient laser ion accelerators for hadron therapy and other applications.

Proposed plan for a JAEA Internationalization Initiative (JII) (Contract research)

Bolton, P. R.; Mizuki, Junichiro; Kawanishi, Shunichi

JAEA-Review 2010-063, 22 Pages, 2011/01

JAEA-Review-2010-063.pdf:0.95MB

Concepts for a JAEA Internationalization Initiative, JII are presented. Following a general discussion of issues and recommendations for JII, a "fast startup JII" is proposed in the form of fast start action items (FSAI). The FSAI represent a clear set of action items that can be implemented at the KPSI/PMRC site which would serve as a seed site for test and evaluation. A JAEA Internationalization Initiative that is guided by evaluation and tailored for JAEA as a whole can be established with appropriate oversight and tracking at each JAEA site by local JII teams. In addition to recommendations for the KPSI/PMRC seed site, the roles of the Quantum Beam Science Directorate (QuBS) leadership and the International Affairs Department (IAD) of JAEA are also discussed. Current KPSI/PMRC activities that are consistent with a JII are briefly presented.

Development of a high-contrast, high beam-quality, high-intensity laser

Kiriyama, Hiromitsu; Mori, Michiaki; Nakai, Yoshiki*; Shimomura, Takuya; Sasao, Hajime*; Tanaka, Momoko; Ochi, Yoshihiro; Tanoue, Manabu*; Kondo, Shuji; Kanazawa, Shuhei; et al.

Reza Kenkyu, 38(9), p.669 - 675, 2010/09

https://ci.nii.ac.jp/naid/10026690779

This paper reviews the temporal contrast and spatial beam quality improvement techniques in a high intensity Ti:sapphire laser system that is based on chirped-pulse amplification (CPA). We describe a low gain optical parametric chirped-pulse amplification (OPCPA) preamplifier that uses high energy, clean pulse seeding and is shown to significantly improve the contrast to better than 10-10 relative to the peak of the main femtosecond pulse. We also report the use of a diffractive optical element for beam homogenization of a 100 J level Nd:glass green pump laser, achieving a flat-topped spatial profile with a filling factor near 80 %.

Test beam-line for laser-driven proton therapy

Sakaki, Hironao; Nishiuchi, Mamiko; Hori, Toshihiko; Bolton, P. R.; Yogo, Akifumi; Ogura, Koichi; Sagisaka, Akito; Pirozhkov, A. S.; Orimo, Satoshi; Kondo, Kiminori; et al.

Proceedings of 7th Annual Meeting of Particle Accelerator Society of Japan (DVD-ROM), p.312 - 315, 2010/08

http://www.pasj.jp/web_publish/pasj7/proceedings/SH_6AM_2/FRSH09.pdf

The beam transport test is carried out through the test beam line of the laser-driven proton accelerator which consists of the phase rotation cavity, PMQ, and bending magnet. The laser system used is J-KAREN at JAEA. The final transmitted bunch duration and transverse profile are well predicted by the PARMILA particle transport code by assuming relatively low initial current of the proton beam. The most probable explanation for this is the space charge neutralization by the laser-plasma-electrons.

High-contrast (10), high-intensity (500 TW) J-KAREN laser system

Kiriyama, Hiromitsu; Mori, Michiaki; Nakai, Yoshiki; Shimomura, Takuya; Sasao, Hajime; Tanaka, Momoko; Ochi, Yoshihiro; Tanoue, Manabu*; Okada, Hajime; Kondo, Shuji; et al.

JAEA-Conf 2010-002, p.18 - 21, 2010/06

https://doi.org/10.11484/jaea-conf-2010-002

We have developed a femtosecond high intensity laser system, which combines both Ti:sapphire chirped-pulse amplification (CPA) and optical parametric chirped-pulse amplification (OPCPA) techniques, that produces more than 30 J broadband output energy, indicating the potential for achieving peak powers in excess of 500 TW. With a cleaned high-energy seeded OPCPA preamplifier as a front-end in the system, for the final compressed pulse (without pumping the booster amplifier) we found that the temporal contrast in this system exceeds 10 on the sub-nanosecond timescale, and is near 10 on the nanosecond timescale before the main femtosecond pulse. Using diffractive optical elements for beam homogenization of 100-J level high-energy Nd:glass green pump laser in a Ti:sapphire final amplifier, we have successfully generated broadband high-energy output with near-perfect top-hat intensity distributions.

DNA double-strand break induction in A549 cells with a single-bunch beam of laser-accelerated protons

Yogo, Akifumi; Maeda, Takuya; Sato, Katsutoshi; Nishikino, Masaharu; Nishiuchi, Mamiko; Sakaki, Hironao; Hori, Toshihiko; Ogura, Koichi; Sagisaka, Akito; Orimo, Satoshi; et al.

Proceedings of 1st International Particle Accelerator Conference (IPAC '10) (Internet), p.91 - 93, 2010/05

https://proceedings.jacow.org/IPAC10/papers/mopea014.pdf

Laser-driven proton accelerator for medical application

Nishiuchi, Mamiko; Sakaki, Hironao; Hori, Toshihiko; Bolton, P. R.; Ogura, Koichi; Sagisaka, Akito; Yogo, Akifumi; Mori, Michiaki; Orimo, Satoshi; Pirozhkov, A. S.; et al.

Proceedings of 1st International Particle Accelerator Conference (IPAC '10) (Internet), p.88 - 90, 2010/05

http://accelconf.web.cern.ch/accelconf/IPAC10/papers/mopea013.pdf

The concept of a compact ion particle accelerator has become attractive in view of recent progress in laser-driven ion acceleration. We report here the recent progress in the laser-driven proton beam transport at the Photo Medical Research Center (PMRC) at JAEA, which is established to address the challenge of laser-driven ion accelerator development for ion beam cancer therapy.

High-energy, high-efficiency second-harmonic generation from a Nd-doped laser with high-quality CsBO crystal

Suzuki, Masayuki; Kiriyama, Hiromitsu; Nakai, Yoshiki*; Okada, Hajime; Daito, Izuru; Bolton, P. R.; Daido, Hiroyuki; Kondo, Kiminori; Kawanishi, Shunichi; Kagebayashi, Yoshio*; et al.

Proceedings of Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics and The Quantum Electronics and Laser Science Conference (CLEO/QELS 2010) (CD-ROM), 2 Pages, 2010/05

http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpls/abs_all.jsp?arnumber=5500372

We have demonstrated efficient second harmonic generation (SHG) of high energy fundamental Nd:YAG laser pulse energy of the multi-joule (J) level at 10-Hz using high optical quality top-seeded solution growth CsBO (TSSG-CBO) crystal. SHG output energy of 1.2 J is obtained with a conversion efficiency of 60%. These results indicate that CBO is a good candidate material for high energy SHG of Nd-doped lasers at the several J level or more with high repetition rate.

Simulation of laser-accelerated proton focusing and diagnosis with a permanent magnet quadrupole triplet

Sakaki, Hironao; Nishiuchi, Mamiko; Hori, Toshihiko; Bolton, P. R.; Tampo, Motonobu; Yogo, Akifumi; Kondo, Kiminori; Kawanishi, Shunichi; Iwase, Hiroshi*; Niita, Koji*

Plasma and Fusion Research (Internet), 5, p.009_1 - 009_2, 2010/03

https://doi.org/10.1585/pfr.5.009

The Monte Carlo Particle and Heavy Ion Transport code (PHITS) was used for diagnosing the focusing and defocusing action of a triplet of permanent magnet quadrupoles on laser-accelerated proton bunches of short duration. The code predicts reasonably well the observed transverse beam profile as measured with a CR-39 track detector demonstrating that PHITS can be used to simulate proton bunch transport by conventional ion optics in the laser-driven case.