Capillary Discharge Soft X-Ray Laser at University of L’Aquila: Laboratory Survey

We report on different experimental investigations regarding the use of the 0.3 mJ, 0.3 Hz, 1.7 ns, 46.9 nm Ar laser developed at the University of L’Aquila. Firstly, we have investigated the potentiality of the EUV laser in the ablation of hard dielectrics such as CaF2 and LiF crystals, which are largely transparent to the visible and to the ltraviolet laser light. We determined the ablation thresholds and the ablation rates for these two crystals and compared the results with the values obtained with other kinds of visible-ultraviolet laser systems. Secondly, we investigated a method to manipulate the intense soft X-ray laser beam based on the use of hollow waveguides. We used monocapillary tubes in a multireflection regime to achieve a substantial modification of the intensity distribution of the beam. These results can be of great interest for several applications of these soft X-ray laser sources.