2020/01/31 by Luling Jin, Meng Wen, Xiaomei Zhang +5
Chemistry · Physics and Astronomy · #Atomic and Molecular Physics #Atomic physics #Chemistry #Hydrogen halide #Laser #Laser-Matter Interactions and Applications #Laser-Plasma Interactions and Diagnostics #Nuclear physics #Optics #Physics #Polarization (electrochemistry) #Proton #physics.acc-ph #physics.plasm-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physreve.102.011201
published as Phys. Rev. E 102, 011201 (2020)
openalex publication_date 2020/07/23 · arxiv created 2020/07/24 · arxiv updated 2020/07/29 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
A method of generating spin-polarized proton beams from a gas jet by using a multipetawatt laser is put forward. With currently available techniques of producing prepolarized monatomic gases from photodissociated hydrogen halide molecules and petawatt lasers, proton beams with energy ≳50 MeV and ≈80% polarization are proved to be obtained. Two-stage acceleration and spin dynamics of protons are investigated theoretically and by means of fully self-consistent three-dimensional particle-in-cell simulations. Our results predict the dependence of the beam polarization on the intensity of the driving laser pulse. Generation of bright energetic polarized proton beams would open a domain of polarization studies with laser driven accelerators and have potential application to enable effective detection in explorations of quantum chromodynamics.