Progress toward ultrahigh intensities with the Titania krypton fluoride laser system

Titania is the latest series of ultraviolet laser systems developed with the highest laser beam brightness. It can be configured in two alternative modes which can deliver a brightness of <1020 W cm-2 sterad-1. The first mode, used a chirped pulse amplification (CPA) to produce the shortest possible pulses. Values of 300 fs on the target are measured. The energy limitations of the CPA scheme are removed in the alternative architecture based on Raman beam combining. The Titania Raman system is designed to operate optimally with pulses of 30-500 ps duration