Experimental demonstration of a synthetic aperture compression scheme for multi-Petawatt high-energy lasers

Jérôme Neauport (1) , N. Blanchot (1) , E Bar (1) , G. Behar (1) , C Bellet (1) , D. Bigourd (1) , F Boubault (1) , C. Chappuis (1) , H. Coïc (1) , C. Damiens-Dupont (1) , O Flour (1) , O Hartmann (1) , L. Hilsz (1) , E. Hugonnot (1) , E. Lavastre (1) , J. Luce (1) , E. Mazataud (1) , S. Noailles (1) , B. Remy (1) , F Sautarel (1) , M Sautet (1) , C. Rouyer (2)

1 CEA-CESTA - Commissariat à l'Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives
2 CESTA - Centre d'études scientifiques et techniques d'Aquitaine

We present the experimental demonstration of a subaperture compression scheme achieved in the PETAL (PETawatt Aquitaine Laser) facility. We evidence that by dividing the beam into small subapertures fitting the available grating size, the sub-beam can be individually compressed below 1 ps, synchronized below 50 fs and then coherently added thanks to a segmented mirror.

Domains: Optics [physics.optics]

Jérôme Neauport, N. Blanchot, E Bar, G. Behar, C Bellet, et al.. Experimental demonstration of a synthetic aperture compression scheme for multi-Petawatt high-energy lasers. Optics Express, 2010, 18, pp.10088-10097. ⟨cea-01692842⟩