A study of X-ray emission from laser heated plasma

This document is a final report on the investigation of laser-plasma interactions leading to pulsed X-ray emission. In the course of this research two topics were looked into in some detail. First, the authors evaluated and found promising a method for efficient laser heating of a turbulent plasma column generated in a double inverse pinch experiment. The results obtained in this ongoing experimental effort, supported primarily by AFOSR, show that the heating method suggested herein leads to a feasible source of intense X-ray pulses. Secondly, the authors looked into effects to be expected when extremely intense laser beams interact with dense plasmas. It was found that under these conditions relativistic effects will lead to intense collimated pulses by synchrotron-like emissions of radiation in the 10 kev region.