Plastic plasma interaction with plasmas with growing atomic number.

This paper describes the investigation of the influence of target material atomic number ( Z) on the laser-produced plasma pressure. For this reason, several target materials representing a wide range of atomic numbers ( Z = 3.5 - 73), i.e. plastic ( CH), Al, Cu, Ag, and Ta, were used. The results presented show that the plasma pressure decreases with growing atomic number but in a limited range of Z only. For higher Z, starting approximately from Z = 47 (Ag), the plasma pressure becomes constant, as confirmed by interferometric measurements and x-ray plasma imaging. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]