Extreme Light Infrastructure, Attosecond Light Pulse Source
ELI-ALPS is the facility of the Extreme Light Infrastructure (ELI) dedicated to the generation, research and application of attosecond light pulses. These extremely ultrashort coherent light pulses are formed by High Harmonic Generation (HHG) of a few-cycle IR laser pulse. HHG can occur using gases or from a specially prepared surface and at ELI-ALPS there are four dedicated Gas HHG beamlines and two surface-based beamlines.
The light generated at ELI-ALPS can be categorised as:
- Few-cycle pulses, from the terahertz/infrared up to the petahertz/ultraviolet, with an impressive 10 Hz to 100 kHz repetition rate
- Attosecond extreme-ultraviolet, soft and hard x-ray mJ pulses with a 10 Hz - 100 kHz repetition rate
- Sub-femtosecond hard x-ray pulses up to 10 keV photon energy with ultra-high contrast with 1 Hz repetition rate
- Controlled ultra-relativistic pulse shapes with ultra-high contrast at a few-Hz repetition rate
These light sources are brilliant; extremely stable, ensuring that every laser pulse is comparable; precisely synchronized with a common clock and guaranteed to run for at least 8 hours/day. ELI-ALPS has been designed and functions so that these light sources can be combined for pump-probe measurement in the attosecond regime.
These optical beamlines are complemented by laser-driven proton, ion and electron beamlines. These particles are generated from relativistic interactions between PW laser pulses and a target: thin films (p+ and ions) and sub-critical density gas targets (e-). These charged particles are subsequently accelerated to extremely high energy (GeV) over an extremely short distance. Independent beamlines are generated using the single cycle (Sylos) and High Field primary lasers.
ELI-ALPS is housed in state-of-the-art facilities exploiting the latest technology in terms of vibration levels, thermal stability, relative humidity, cleanliness and radiation protection. There are 3 different work areas with different level of shielding enabling ELI-ALPS to offer both open and closed experiments. These facilities are complemented by separate chemical, biological and medical support laboratories for in-house sample preparation. There is a large in-house support staff that includes electrical, mechanical and optical workshops.
| Laser Parameters | High repetition rate laser system - HR1 | Mid-infrared laser system - MIR | SYLOS Alignment laser system - SYLOS AL |
|---|---|---|---|
| Source type | Laser | laser | laser |
| Laser type | Fiber CPA with nonlinear post-compression | NOPCPA | NOPCPA based on Yb fiber oscillator and Nd: YAG pump laser |
| Photon energy range / wavelength range | 700 - 1300 [nm] | 890 - 910 [nm] | |
| Peak Photon energy / central wavelenght | 1030 [nm] | 3180 [nm] | 900 [nm] |
| Tunability | 44.02 [%] | 0 [%] | |
| Beam shape | Gaussian | Gaussian | Flat top |
| Pulse duration FWHM | 6.2 [fs] | 4 [cycles] | 50 [fs] |
| Polarisation | Linear Horizontal | Linear Horizontal | |
| Pulse repetition rate | 1 * 105 [Hz] | 1 * 105 [Hz] | 10 [Hz] |
| Maximum pulse energy | 1 [mJ] | 1.52 * 10-4 [J] | 40 [mJ] |
| Peak power | 1.6 * 1011 [W] | ||
| Pointing stability on target | 10 [%] | ||
| Beam diameter | 8 [mm] | 10 [mm] | 80 [mm] |
The first commissioning user call was published.
We are kindly inviting you to join this challenging mission by performing the very first commissioning user experiments in order to fine-tune the already operational research technology equipment as well as the user office procedures and user services of ELI-ALPS.
Please see the details on the given webpage link.