Particle simulation studies for fast ignitor research — collisional effects on laser–plasma interactions

Relativistic binary collision effects on intense laser–plasma interactions were investigated by the Monte Carlo Coulomb model into a particle simulation code. Our collision model is fully relativistic and collision frequencies are calculated in the framework of quantum electrodynamics (QED). As benchmark tests, we simulated the following two cases. The first one is for the electron heat transport in a steep temperature gradient and the second is for the electron energy distribution function of plasmas heated by the inverse bremsstrahulung. The results of the simulations agree well with previous works. The surface plasma heating and fast ion generation have also been investigated for a solid target interaction with an intense laser beam. The collisional effects are very important even in the intensity range of 1018–1019 W/cm2.