Laser-produced annular plasmas

A new technique is presented for the formation of annular plasmas on a metal surface with a high-power laser using a combination of axicon and converging lenses. The annular plasma formed on a titanium target in a chamber of hydrogen gas was investigated using schlieren imaging and Mach Zehnder interferometry. Expansion of the plasma was shown to be anisotropic with velocities of similar to 10(3)-10(4) m/s. Electron densities of 10(18) cm(-3) were measured with radial profiles that confirm the presence of a hollow structure. The interferometric observations also show the presence of an inward shock wave traveling to the center of the annular plasma, which compresses the background neutrals, reaching a density around 18 times initial gas density, at 95 ns after the initial annular plasma is produced.