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Under controlled laboratory conditions, lasers represent a source of energy with well-defined parameters suitable for mimicking phenomena such as ablation, disintegration, and plasma formation processes that take place during the hypervelocity atmospheric entry of meteoroids. Furthermore, lasers have also been proposed for employment in future space exploration and planetary defense in a wide range of potential applications. This highlights the importance of an experimental investigation of lasers' interaction with real samples of interplanetary matter: meteorite specimens. We summarize the results of numerous meteorite laser ablation experiments performed by several laser sources—a femtosecond Ti:Sapphire laser, the multislab ceramic Yb:YAG Bivoj laser, and the iodine laser known as PALS (Prague Asterix Laser System). The differences in the ablation spots' morphology and their dependence on the laser parameters are examined via optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, and profilometry in the context of the meteorite properties and the physical characteristics of laser-induced plasma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spectra of meteor plasma, their dynamics and dominant spectral features are usually a subject of mathematical modelling and computations. In our study, on the other hand, we describe and evaluate the advantages and limitations of the experimental techniques employed for meteor spectra simulations. The experiments are performed by ablating meteorite samples using a series of laser sources, i.e. a large terawatt−class gas laser infrastructure PALS, a high-power Ti:Sapphire femtosecond laser, and laboratory Nd:YAG and ArF excimer lasers. We demonstrate that, notwithstanding the importance of theoretical spectra computation, laboratory experiments may remarkably enhance the qualitative and quantitative evaluation of the meteor emission spectra measured, as well as the assignment of important spectral features therein. We also perform completing experiments to compare the laser-target interaction observed with the expected dynamics of evaporation and disintegration of a real meteoroid body. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]