TY - JOUR
T1 - Extended Propagation of Powerful Laser Pulses in Focusing Kerr Media
AU - Malkin, V. M.
AU - Fisch, N. J.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 American Physical Society.
PY - 2016/9/20
Y1 - 2016/9/20
N2 - Powerful incoherent laser pulses can propagate in focusing Kerr media much longer distances than can coherent pulses, due to the fast phase mixing that prevents transverse filamentation. This distance is limited by 4-wave scattering, which accumulates waves at small transverse wave numbers, where phase mixing is too slow to retain the incoherence and thus prevent the filamentation. However, we identify how this theoretical limit can be overcome by countering this accumulation through transverse heating of the pulse by random fluctuations of the refractive index. Thus, the laser pulse propagation distances are significantly extended, making feasible, in particular, the generation of unprecedentedly intense and powerful short laser pulses in a plasma by means of backward Raman amplification in new random laser regimes.
AB - Powerful incoherent laser pulses can propagate in focusing Kerr media much longer distances than can coherent pulses, due to the fast phase mixing that prevents transverse filamentation. This distance is limited by 4-wave scattering, which accumulates waves at small transverse wave numbers, where phase mixing is too slow to retain the incoherence and thus prevent the filamentation. However, we identify how this theoretical limit can be overcome by countering this accumulation through transverse heating of the pulse by random fluctuations of the refractive index. Thus, the laser pulse propagation distances are significantly extended, making feasible, in particular, the generation of unprecedentedly intense and powerful short laser pulses in a plasma by means of backward Raman amplification in new random laser regimes.
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U2 - 10.1103/PhysRevLett.117.133901
DO - 10.1103/PhysRevLett.117.133901
M3 - Article
C2 - 27715125
AN - SCOPUS:84989818040
SN - 0031-9007
VL - 117
JO - Physical review letters
JF - Physical review letters
IS - 13
M1 - 133901
ER -