Review on Recent Developments in Laser Driven Inertial Fusion

Figure 9

Relativistic self-focusing [26]: relativistic change of electron mass results in shorter optical propagation at higher intensity than at lower intensity. Relativistic self-focusing of a laser beam from the left with a dashed Gaussian intensity profile and radius 𝑑_𝑜/2 moves into plasma right from the vertical line. Due to the relativistic change of the electron mass at the quiver motion, the effective wave length within the plasma is dielectrically shorter at higher intensity then at lower causing a concave bending of the initially plane wave front with shrinking of the beam to less than wave length diameter [26, 31, 32].