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I'm an engineer having experience in the field of laser physics. I'm in charge of operating and managing femtosecond high-power laser based on the technique called chirped pulse amplification (CPA). Gerald Mourou and Donna Strickland, Nobel laureate 2018, developed the CPA technique and related applications.
More than 10^23 W/cm^2 peak power is expected from tightly focused 10-petawatt femtosecond laser pulses. When the thin metal sheet exposed to the focused laser pulse, it emits several kinds of charged particles - electrons, protons, and heavy ions. With these particles, it is possible to make high energy photons like x-ray and gamma-ray.
Charged particles and high energy photons are very important sources for medical use - diagnostic and treatment of cancer. With this laser, we are able to develop the alternative particle accelerator with reduced dimension maintaining the same energy and flux as conventional one (cyclotron and synchrotron).
The research objective is making high-energy multi-species charged particle using the laser. It will give a momentum to commercialize the cancer therapy machine which medium & large sized hospitals can accommodate.
To realize the above vision it is important to make the laser system showing optimized performances. However, it is an uneasy feat to do. The reason why as follows.
The laser system occupies the whole space on the first floor of an office building. It is composed of several modules called oscillator, amplifier, and stretcher/compressor pair. Every module has various optical components such as the small & large-size mirrors, gain media, and pumping sources (lasers emitting nanosecond pulses).
The prerequisite is automation by controlling every component in the laser system. The best solution to address the issue is, I think, distributed soft real-time control systems for scientific instruments with the help of artificial intelligence. Unfortunately, I have any experience in this field. So I trying to find the way of getting knowledge.