XUV interaction and warm dense matter at QUB

The interaction of XUV photons with matter is an important sub area of warm dense matter studies of key interest in astrophysical plasmas, planetary sciences and fusion sciences. It is also of key interest in advanced lithography methods that will use ~13.5nm XUV photons for processing of next generation electronics. We propose to carry out a study of the interaction of XUV radiation with matter including warm dense matter, with experiments on collisional absorption, ablation with XUV radiation and creation of novel states of matter. We will base the work in large measure at the TARANIS laser facility at QUB but will also use our access to external facilities such as the new XUV and X-ray free electron lasers as well as larger laser facilities.In the proposal our discussion of previous work is centred around TARANIS as this is most relevant and illustrates the potential of the system. In the discussion of experiments, we concentrate on details of a couple of particular experiments that will take a long time to perform and set up as this illustrates the type of complex experiment we will be able to field.

For some of the research we propose the understanding gained will be relatively fundamental in nature and the industrial/technological consequences are not easy to see especially in the short to medium term. The interaction of XUV radiation with warm dense matter is of relevance to the fuel and ablator of an intertial confinement fusion target and in this respect there may be technological consequences, if we can ascertain more information in the effective collisional absorption coefficient. However, for the ablation side of the work there is a more obvious link to future applications. There is a strong move in industry and academioc research to develop XUV lithography techniques for future generations of electronics. This is because in principle the features created can be smaller- being limited by wavelength. To this end there has been a lot of work in developing XUV sources in the ~13.5nm regime. It can be said that the interaction of XUV radiation with matter is of consequence, since there is substantial work ongoing regarding the use of XUV radiation for advanced lithography. To this end the work on XUV ablation is relevant