Search

After the development of chirped pulse amplification by G. Mouro, laser ion acceleration has attracted a lot of interest for various fields of research, such as high energy density physics, nuclear physics, and fast ignition scheme in inertial confinement fusion. Recent theoretical and numerical investigations predict generation of sub-GeV to GeV energy ions. However, it is difficult to discriminate GeV-scale ions into different mass and energies using conventional diagnostic instruments (e.g. Thomson parabola spectrometer, solid state nuclear track detector). We have developed a novel diagnostic system based on particle counting analysis (PCA), which is generally used in nuclear physics experiments. The diagnosis provides a mass-dependent ion spectrum based on time-of-flight and pulse-height analysis of single particle events. With a novel arrangement of multiple scintillators with different ion stopping powers, PCA offers potential advantages over commonly used diagnostics in terms of coverage solid angle, detection efficiency, and real-time analysis for GeV-scale ions. The basic detector setup was tested using the Heavy Ion Medical Accelerator in Chiba (HIMAC) in Japan. Our system shows its ability to resolve protons, B^5+, C^6+, and O^8+ ion beams with energy range of 60-430 MeV/u. We also discuss an advanced detector design using multi-layered scintillator pixel array coupled with avalanche photodiodes, which allows angularly-resolved analysis and makes PCA more practical diagnostic technique in laser-driven particle acceleration experiments., High Temperature Plasma Diagnostics Conference 2022