Applications of terawatt lasers

Experiments using high-power laser radiation have recently become much more feasible through the development of chirped pulse amplification. By using titanium sapphire as the gain medium, very compact and high-repetition rate systems reaching terawatt power levels can be constructed. Within the newly established Lund High Power Laser Facility we operate such a system (150 fs, 1.5 TW, 10 Hz, tunable 760-840 nm), which is being employed in a number of basic and applied studies requiring high optical powers. Detailed studies of highharmonic generation in inert gases are reported as well as the generation of hard X-rays from microplasmas. Ultrasharp medical imaging has been achieved. Intense white-light generation by self-phase modulation in water has been used for biological tissue studies and for photon migration studies in green leaves.