Laser acceleration of ions: recent results and prospects for applications

We present a brief review of recent theoretical and numerical simulation results on the acceleration of ions from various targets irradiated by high-power femtosecond laser pulses. The results include: the optimization of the laser–plasma acceleration of ions over the thickness of a solid target; a new dependence of the energy of accelerated protons from a semi-transparent foil on the incident pulse energy; a theoretical model of plasma layer expansion in the vacuum for a fixed temperature of heated electrons, describing arbitrary regimes of particle acceleration, from the quasineutral flow of a plasma to Coulomb explosion; analytic theories of the relativistic Coulomb explosion of a spherical microtarget and the radial ponderomotive acceleration of ions from a laser channel in a transparent plasma; and calculations optimizing the production of isotopes for medicine using next-generation lasers.