Breaking limits: Full-aperture grating compressor paves the way for single-channel 100-petawatt ultrafast lasers
image: The schematic of experimental setup based on the SULF-10 PW laser, the original beam shapeand the four-grating compressor are modified to realize an equivalent FAGC.
Credit: Ultrafast Science
Recently, a research team from Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics (SIOM), Chinese Academy of Sciences, published a groundbreaking study in Ultrafast Science, demonstrating a novel Full-Aperture Grating Compressor (FAGC). This innovation overcomes critical limitations in traditional 4-grating compressors and provides key technical support for achieving single-channel 100-petawatt (PW) ultra-intense ultrafast lasers, a milestone in extreme physics research.
Super-intense ultrafast lasers can generate extreme experimental conditions and represent a pivotal instrument in the study of extreme physical phenomena, and thereby can bring significant breakthroughs and advance for high field science. Conventional 4-grating compressors have been hindered by the restriction of grating aperture, which has impeded the further enhancement of laser output peak power. The FAGC can carry higher laser energy within the damage threshold of gratings through maximizing the use of grating aperture, and hence achieve higher laser peak power. The numerical simulation and proof-of-principle experiment of FAGC are carried out based on SULF-10 PW laser facility. The results indicate that there is no obvious degradation of the spatiotemporal characteristics of output pulses when compared with the pulses output from a traditional 4-grating compressor. This work efficiently proves the practical feasibility of FAGC, and also strongly support the application of FAGC in Shanghai HIgh repetitioN rate XFEL and Extreme light facility (SHINE).
Consequently, the single-channel 100 PW super-intense ultrafast lasers are very promising to be achieved based on the combination of broadband OPCPA amplification technique and the FAGC compressor with H 1070 mm × L 1620 mm golden gratings, which is of significant academic value and engineering significance. The relevant breakthroughs are expected to promote the exploration of frontier science, such as high-field physics and quantum electrodynamics (QED). Moreover, the FAGC can also be applied in the existing super-intense ultrafast laser facilities for upgrading the laser peak power.