Relativistic laser plasma research for fast ignition laser fusion

Reviewed are the present status and future prospects of the laser fusion research at the ILE (Institute of Laser Engineering) Osaka. The Gekko XII and Peta Watt laser system have been operated for investigating the fast ignition, the relativistic laser plasma interactions and so on. In particular, the fast ignition experiments with cone shell target have been in progress as the UK and US-Japan collaboration programs. In the experiments, the imploded high density plasmas are heated by irradiating 500 J level peta watt laser pulse. The thermal neutron yield is found to increase by three orders of magnitude by injecting the peta watt laser into the cone shell target. Transport of relativistic high density electron is the critical issue as the basic physics for understanding the dense plasma heating process. By the theory, simulation and experiment, the collective phenomena in the interactions of intense relativistic electron current with dense plasmas has been investigated to find the formation of self organized flow as the result of filamentation (Weibel) instability. Through the present understanding, the new project, FIREX-I has started recently to prove the principle of the fast ignition scheme. (author)