The LASERIX platform, created in 2004, was attached to IJCLab in 2020. Based on a laser designed to reach 300 TW and produce coherent extreme UV radiation (EUV, 10-40 eV), its current performance is limited to 40 TW but the fields of application at IJCLab have expanded.
EUV sources from laser-excited plasma have been enriched by the development of high-quality plasma-amplified high-order harmonic (HOE) sources. Recent work concerns the production of optical vortices HOE, annular beams propagating in a spiral with novel properties of interaction with matter. Two theses in collaboration with the company Imagine Optic have been carried out on this subject which continues with the amplification of an EUV vortex beam by plasma.
LASERIX at IJCLab is also a project support platform. The laser is currently upgraded to 50 TW for the PALLAS project to build a prototype compact electron accelerator by laser plasma at 200 MeV. Devices to qualify each laser pulse with feedbacks are developed for active AI optimization. LASERIX participates in the TWAC project as an exciting source of photoelectrons for the RF gun, and to produce the THz wave dedicated to the acceleration of electrons in a dielectric waveguide. PALLAS and TWAC are used in the casemate of the PHIL cannon, an area now called EXALT.
For the DELLIGHT project, LASERIX participates in demonstrating experimentally that the electromagnetic field carried by an ultra-intense laser pulse can modify the refractive index of vacuum. The detector prototype, a Sagnac interferometer, is developed in the LASERIX room. The extreme sensitivity of the device will require the provision of an isolated area for high energy use.
LASERIX is also a tool intended for the training of students in the field of power lasers through practical work set up in a dedicated space close to the laser.