Page 11 - Demo

Coherent Amplification Network (CAN) laser concept is shown in Fig. 5. The pulse is generated by XCAN laser making possible very high-pump pulse repetition rate up to 100 kHz. The femtosecond pulses are produced by a femtosecond oscillator, delivering over a million pulses per second. After the oscillator, the pulses are selected to have the appropriate pulse rate, of up to 100kHz before it is stretched to a few nanoseconds. After stretching the pulse is amplified in the cryogenic OPCPA to the tens of mJ level. The reason to use a cryogenically cooled OPCPA stem from the extremely high thermal conductivity of crystal cryogenically cooled [45], comparable to copper. This is necessary to evacuate the tens of kW thermal load produced during the optical parametric amplification process. The amplified chirped pulse is then compressed back to its initial value of < 10fs. If necessary, such pulses may be further compressed through the Thin Film Compression [46]. CAN laser may be replaced by the thin disk amplifier [47].
Figure 4: Details of the laser system for generation of neutrons as well as for active monitoring.