IONS AND ELECTRONS GENERATED BY AN UV EXCIMER-LASER

High energy excimer laser photons favour the generation of heavy ions as well as the generation of electrons from metal targets. This experimental work reports the generation of lead ions extracted from a hot laser-generated plasma and the generation of electrons from yttrium targets having a work function of 3.1 eV, both by an XeCl (4.02 eV) excimer laser. At laser fluences of 75 MW/cm2, an output beam formed by Pb3+, Pb2+ and Pb1+ ions was extracted. With an acceleration voltage of 500 V between the Pb target and the collector, the peak current of the Pb3+ pulse was 1.4 A large. Besides, the application of a low value capacitance in the accelerating region, allowed the extraction only of the highest charge ions. Modifying the acceleration chamber and applying an accelerating voltage of 10 keV, an output electrons beam having 15.6 nC (3.6 A/cm2 peak current) was obtained from Y targets.