Abstract
Progress in femtosecond laser technology1 has made a strong impact on the field of laser-plasma interaction. With the development of chirped pulse amplification2 and new broadband solid state laser materials, femtosecond laser pulses with peak power in the terawatt range and focused intensities greater than 1018W/cm2 can be generated with relatively small-scale, table-top laser systems. The electric field strengths corresponding to these intensities are comparable with the Coulomb field in atoms. During the interaction with such an intense laser pulse atomic, molecular or any condensed form of matter is very rapidly ionized and turned into a plasma. Thus the physics of laser-plasma interaction is of fundamental importance for a broad class of applications of intense femtosecond laser pulses.
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von der Linde, D. (1997). Laser-Plasma Interaction in the Femtosecond Time Regime. In: Burke, P.G., Joachain, C.J. (eds) Photon and Electron Collisions with Atoms and Molecules. Physics of Atoms and Molecules. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-5917-7_19
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-5917-7_19
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