EXPERIMENTS ON THE INTERACTION OF HEAVY-IONS WITH DENSE-PLASMA AT GSI-DARMSTADT

One of the main objectives of the experimental plasma physics activiti es at the Gesellschaft fur Schwerionenforschung (GSI) are the interact ion processes of heavy ions with dense ionized matter. Gas-discharge p lasma targets were used for energy loss and charge state measurements in a regime of electron density and temperature up to 10(19) cm(-3) an d 20 eV, respectively. An improved model of the charge exchange proces ses in fully ionized hydrogen plasma, taking into account multiple exc ited electronic configurations which subsequently ionize, has removed the discrepancies of previous theoretical descriptions. The energy los s of the ion beam in partially ionized plasmas such as argon was found to agree very well with our simple theoretical model based on the mod ified Bethe-Bloch theory. A new setup with a 100 J/5 GW Nd-glass laser now provides access to density ranges up to 10(21) cm-3 and temperatu res of up to 100 eV. First results of interaction experiments with las er-produced plasma are presented. To fully exploit the experimental po ssibilities of the new laser-plasma setup both improved charge state d etection systems and better plasma diagnostics are indispensable. Pres ent developments and future possibilities in these fields are presente d. This paper summarizes the following contributions: Interaction of h eavy-ion beams with laser plasma by C. Stockl et al. Energy loss of he avy ions in a laser-produced plasma by M. Roth et al. Charge state mea surements of heavy ions passing a laser produced plasma with high time resolution by W. Suss et al. Plasma diagnostics for laser-produced pl asma by O. Iwase et al. Future possibilities of plasma diagnostics at GSI by M. Geissel et al. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights res erved.