Radiation pressure driven acceleration of ions during the interaction of an extremely intense circularly polarised laser pulse with a solid target

We consider a possibility of effective acceleration of ions due to the light pressure force from an extreme intense circularly polarised laser pulse. Using full-size 3D particle-in-cell simulation, the target parameters, such as thickness and concentration, and the degree of laser radiation focusing are found to be optimal from the point of view of the conversion efficiency of radiation energy into ion energy, ion cutoff energy and ion charge. It is shown that, with the laser radiation parameters expected at the XCELS facility, it is possible to accelerate ions to an energy of up to 1.7 GeV·nucleon^–1 with a conversion efficiency reaching 40% and an ion charge with an energy of more than 500 MeV·nucleon^–1 exceeding 50 nC.