A burst of energy more powerful than any other laser in the United States just fired from the ZEUS facility – at a jaw-dropping 2 petawatts.
As a user facility, ZEUS offers its capabilities to researchers across the U.S. and around the world.
Laser beams accelerate electrons The team uses two synchronized laser beams.
More ZEUS laser testing Later this year, ZEUS plans to run its signature test.
It’s reshaping what’s possible for high-powered laser research in the U.S. – and doing it with shared access and global collaboration at its core.
The ZEUS facility recently released a stunning 2 petawatt energy burst, more powerful than any laser in the United States. In one pulse, that amounts to two quadrillion watts. The flash is so short that it only lasts for 25 quintillionths of a second.
At its highest output, ZEUS momentarily surpasses the world’s electrical grid by a factor of 100. However, raw power isn’t the only factor here. The field of ultrafast laser experiments is entering a new era with enormous potential.
A national lab with a common goal.
The University of Michigan-based Zettawatt-Equivalent Ultrashort Pulse Laser System, or ZEUS, recently finished its first formal experiment at this powerful 2-petawatt level.
The lab is supported by the U.S. government and is a part of the Gérard Mourou Center for Ultrafast Optical Science. S. . The NSF is the National Science Foundation.
“This milestone signifies the start of experiments that break new ground for American high field science,” said the center’s director, Karl Krushelnick.
ZEUS is a user facility that makes its capabilities available to researchers throughout the United States. A. as well as globally. It is a genuinely collaborative space for discovery, with teams applying to conduct experiments through an independent selection process.
The ZEUS laser is unique.
Franklin Dollar, a professor at the University of California, Irvine (UCI), said, “Splitting the light into multiple beams is one of the great things about ZEUS—it’s not just one big laser hammer.”. At full capacity, Dollar’s team is conducting the first user experiment.
With a device that can fit in a school gym, they hope to produce high-energy electron beams that are on par with those produced by particle accelerators that are kilometers long.
Energy levels five to ten times higher than those previously produced by ZEUS are the target of Dollar’s experiment.
In lasers, electrons are accelerated.
They use two laser beams that are synchronized. One makes a guiding channel, and the other speeds up electrons in that direction.
“We want to use two different laser beams to reach higher electron energies – one to create a guiding channel and the other to accelerate electrons through it,” explained Anatoly Maksimchuk, a research scientist at the University of Michigan who is in charge of the setup.
Plasma physics is necessary for this procedure. Helium gas is transformed into plasma, a soup of free electrons and ions, by the laser blast. The process known as wakefield acceleration occurs when electrons surf behind the laser pulse.
When the gas cell is extended and its density is decreased, electrons remain in the accelerating zone for a longer period of time before surpassing the pulse. They can travel at far greater speeds as a result.
Further testing of ZEUS lasers.
ZEUS will conduct its signature test later this year. A laser pulse originating from the opposite direction will collide with accelerated electrons.
The laser’s 3-petawatt pulse will appear a million times more powerful in the electrons’ reference frame, reaching the “zettawatt equivalent” level that is the source of the term “ZEUS.”.
“There are numerous potential uses for the basic research conducted at the NSF ZEUS facility, such as improving soft tissue imaging techniques and developing cancer treatment and other disease technologies,” said Vyacheslav Lukin, NSF program director.
“By utilizing ZEUS’s special capabilities, scientists will push the boundaries of human knowledge in novel ways and open up new avenues for American economic development and innovation. “”.
Little area, great power.
The ZEUS facility is incredibly powerful for such a small space. To lessen its intensity, diffraction gratings stretch out the laser’s initial infrared pulse.
After that, it goes through four amplifier stages. The beam’s maximum dimensions are several feet long and 12 inches (30 cm) wide.
A second set of gratings compresses the beam as it enters a vacuum chamber, creating a disk that is only 8 microns thick—ten times thinner than paper. To reach maximum intensity, it is then concentrated to less than a micron.
“As a midscale facility, we can function more quickly than large-scale facilities like the National Ignition Facility or particle accelerators,” said John Nees, a research scientist in charge of ZEUS laser construction. This transparency draws fresh concepts from a larger scientific community. “”.
ZEUS’s construction has not been simple.
It hasn’t been an easy road to two petawatts. Obtaining components has proven to be a significant obstacle, particularly for the titanium sapphire crystal that serves as the final amplifier’s core.
It’s one of the few in the world, measuring almost 7 inches (18 centimeters) in width.
“It took four and a half years to manufacture the crystal that we’re going to get in the summer, and it will get us to three petawatts,” stated Franko Bayer, project manager for ZEUS.
There were problems even with scaling up to 1 petawatt. Alarms were raised during tests when the diffraction gratings darkened.
After identifying the root cause—carbon deposits from degraded air molecules in the vacuum chamber—the team created a maintenance plan to clean them in between tests.
We’re just getting started with the ZEUS laser.
Since its launch in October 2023, ZEUS has hosted 58 researchers from 22 institutions and supported 11 experiments.
The team continues to work steadily toward their 3-petawatt target, but there is still a lot of science to be done with a 1-petawatt pulse.
This facility does more than simply push the envelope. It is redefining the possibilities for advanced laser research in the United States. S. . -and doing so with the fundamental principles of global cooperation and shared access.
Watch a video that explains how ZEUS works by clicking here.
Information about the study was taken from a press release issued by the University of Michigan.
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