Demonstration of a neon-like argon x-ray laser using a short-pulse laser-irradiated gas puff target

In this work we demonstrate a soft x-ray laser with neon- like argon ions using a gas puff target irradiated with a combination of long 600 ps and short 6 ps high-power laser pulses with a total of 10 J energy. The gas puff target was formed by pulsed injection of gas from a high-pressure solenoid valve through a nozzle in the form of a narrow slit. The target was irradiated in a traveling-wave excitation geometry. Lasing was observed on the 3p 1S0 implies 3s 1P1 transition at 46.9 nm and the 3d 1P1 implies 3p 1P1 transition at 45.1 nm. Gain of 11 cm-1 was measured on these transitions for targets up to 0.9 cm long.

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