Projects

Ionization of air with intense laser pulses

By applying ultra-intense femtosecond laser pulses and femtosecond-nanosecond pulse sequences, we create extended plasma channels in ambient air. Potential applications of these plasmas range from the remote initiation of transient lasing in the atmosphere to channeling lightning strikes. In this project we collaborate with the scientists from the Jupiter Laser Facility at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

 

 

Intense laser beam engineering

We apply intense laser pulses with exotic beam shapes for the production of plasma channels and channel arrays in air. Self-bending Airy beams produce curved plasma channels while intense optical vortices generate bottle-like distributions of plasma channels that can be used for guiding microwave radiation.

 

Investigations of material modification with femtosecond laser pulses

Physical processes involved in permanent material modification by ultra-short laser pulses are extremely complex and occur across vastly dissimilar time scales from femtoseconds to microseconds. Our research is aimed at the development of new predictive models describing the physics of femtosecond laser-matter interactions and at the experimental validation of these models. In this project we collaborate with the scientists from the Australian National University and from the Colorado School of Mines.