Conditions Analysis of Laser-Driven Plasma Jet

Laser-driven plasma jets provide a new way to simulate astrophysical jets and generate shockless loading in solids to high pressures, which are very important in the researches of high energy density physics. The experiments are all under the conditions with very high laser intensity in literatures, but there is no criterion of the basic condition under which the plasma jets can form from the rear surface of the driven film. The main objective of the current study is to investigate the effects of laser intensity, wavelength, pulse width, target material, and target thickness on plasma jet using analytic numerical methods. The results show that the shock strength before exiting the rear of the reservoir must be higher than a threshold value for jet formation. For polyethylene, this value is about 80 GPa. The lower wavelength, boiling temperature, and ionization threshold value, and higher laser intensity, longer pulse width, thinner target, the plasma jet is more easily achieved for the thin target with low boiling temperature and small ionization threshold value when irradiated by a pulsed laser with high intensity, short wavelength and long pulse width.