Speaker
Description
Improved control of high intensity laser beam parameters on target recently enabled laser accelerated proton bunches with energies beyond 100 MeV, dose-controlled irradiation of biological samples, and the demonstration of FEL gain based on laser wakefield acceleration of electrons.
This presentation focuses on the chain of developments at the Petawatt laser DRACO at Helmholtz-Center Dresden-Rossendorf that enabled the first dose controlled systematic irradiation of tumors in mice with laser accelerated protons as well as record proton energies. Details on acceleration mechanisms and strategies to increase stability and energy will be discussed as well as beam transport by means of a dedicated pulsed solenoid beamline to a secondary target together with online metrology and dosimetry. In parallel, improved control of interaction parameters together with different types of targets operated close to relativistic induced transparency enabled the exploitation of acceleration mechanisms surpassing target normal sheath acceleration. Here, proton energies well beyond 100 MeV could be reached as well as target readiness demonstrated for increased repetition rate operation.
Footnotes
- F. Kroll, et al., Nature Physics 18, 316 (2022)
** T. Ziegler et al., Nature Physics 20, 1211 (2024)
*** M. Rehwald, et al., Nature Communications 14, 4009 (2023)
**** M. Labat, et al., Nature Photonics 17, 150 (2023)
