Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, 1 Homi Bhabha Road, Colaba, Mumbai, 400 005, India.
Department of Physics, Lund University, P.O. Box 118, 221 00, Lund, Sweden.
Sci Rep. 2017 Jun 20;7(1):3871. doi: 10.1038/s41598-017-04152-3.
Recent advances in high-intensity laser-produced plasmas have demonstrated their potential as compact charge particle accelerators. Unlike conventional accelerators, transient quasi-static charge separation acceleration fields in laser produced plasmas are highly localized and orders of magnitude larger. Manipulating these ion accelerators, to convert the fast ions to neutral atoms with little change in momentum, transform these to a bright source of MeV atoms. The emittance of the neutral atom beam would be similar to that expected for an ion beam. Since intense laser-produced plasmas have been demonstrated to produce high-brightness-low-emittance beams, it is possible to envisage generation of high-flux, low-emittance, high energy neutral atom beams in length scales of less than a millimeter. Here, we show a scheme where more than 80% of the fast ions are reduced to energetic neutral atoms and demonstrate the feasibility of a high energy neutral atom accelerator that could significantly impact applications in neutral atom lithography and diagnostics.
近年来，高强度激光产生的等离子体的发展已经证明了它们作为紧凑型带电粒子加速器的潜力。与传统加速器不同，激光产生等离子体中的瞬态准静态电荷分离加速场高度局域化，并且量级大得多。操纵这些离子加速器，将快速离子转换为中性原子，而动量几乎没有变化，将它们转化为 MeV 原子的明亮源。中性原子束的发射度将与离子束的发射度相似。由于已经证明高强度激光产生的等离子体可以产生高亮度低发射度的束流，因此可以设想在小于一毫米的长度尺度上产生高通量、低发射度、高能中性原子束。在这里，我们展示了一种方案，其中超过 80%的快离子被转化为高能中性原子，并证明了高能中性原子加速器的可行性，这可能会对中性原子光刻和诊断等应用产生重大影响。
