Access Facilities - FSU-IOQ

Contact: Gerhard Paulus Email

>> access projects performed by FSU-IOQ users

Jena is a mid-sized town situated in one of the most beautiful and historically most significant regions in Germany. More than anything else, life in Jena is characterized by the university and the optical industry. The Helmholtz Institute Jena and Friedrich Schiller University jointly operate the laser facilities that are open for external users through the Laser Lab Access program. Several research groups within these institutions have ample experience in design, operation, and application of high-power lasers. Examples are the all-diode pumped PW-class femtosecond laser Polaris, several ground-breaking contributions in strong-field laser physics and relativistic laser plasma physics, and one of the finest labs for X-ray optics and spectroscopy.

Research opportunities within the Laserlab access activity:

The 45-TW Ti:Sapphire laser JETI delivers 1.5-J, 25-fs pulses at 10 Hz repetition rate, leading to intensities of 10^20 W/cm2. A plasma mirror supporting 10-Hz repetition rate in burst mode improves contrast to better than 10^11. The pulse contrast can be adjusted thus providing means to engineer the plasma conditions, in particular the plasma scale length. The pulses can be used in two different interaction chambers. An extensive set of diagnostics for imaging and spectroscopy from the IR to the UV and even the X-ray regime is available. Spatially and spectrally resolved measurements of x-rays (0.1 to several MeV) or laser-produced electron and ion pulses are possible.

In addition, we provide access to a phase-stabilized few-cycle laser system providing sub-5-fs, 0.8-mJ laser pulses at 4 kHz repetition rate. The speciality of this system is several phase meters capable of measuring the CE phase of each individual laser pulse in real time. This opens the opportunity of phase tagging and very often allows avoiding phase stabilization while providing as much accuracy. In addition, this facility can provide several electron spectrometers.

The Helmholtz Institute Jena has a vigorous program to enhance her experimental capabilities even further. In particular, we will add a 100-TW beam line and new target rooms to the lab within the next 18 months.