5-Hz, 150-TW Ti:sapphire Laser with High Spatiotemporal Quality

Abstract

150-TW, 23-fs laser pulses with high spatial and temporal qualities have been generated at 5 Hz from a chirped-pulse amplification Ti:sapphire laser. The temporal and the spatial qualities of the laser pulse were optimized and characterized for high availability in the fields of high-field science and relativistic laser-matter interactions. The pulse duration was optimized by maximizing the spectral bandwidth and by minimizing the spectral phase error. A temporal contrast was enhanced using an ultrafast Pockels cell and a double plasma mirror, and wavefront aberrations were corrected using an adaptive optics system. Spatiotemporal couplings were characterized by measuring a frequency-resolved wavefront to estimate their effect on the peak intensity at the focus. Due to the high spatiotemporal quality resulting from this optimization and characterization of the laser beam, the 5-Hz 150-TW Ti:sapphire laser will be the workhorse for a variety of research on relativistic laser-matter interactions.