Weibel-mediated collisionless shocks in laser-irradiated dense plasmas: Prevailing role of the electrons in generating the field fluctuations

We present a particle-in-cell simulation of the generation of a collisionless strong shock in a dense plasma driven by an ultra-intense, plane-wave laser pulse. A linear theory analysis, based on a multi-waterbag model of the particle distributions, highlights the role of the laser-heated electrons in triggering the Weibel-like instability causing shock formation. It is demonstrated that the return-current electrons play a major role in the instability development as well as in the determination of the saturated magnetic field. By contrast, the ions are found of minor importance in driving the instability and the magnetic field fluctuations responsible for their isotropization. Finally, we show that a Weibel-mediated shock can also be generated by a focused laser pulse of large enough spot size. (C) 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.