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Experimental scaling of diffraction efficiency in laser-induced plasma gratings

M. M. Wang1,*,†, V. M. Perez-Ramirez2,*,‡, N. M. Fasano1, K. Ou2, S. Cao2, V. Dewan1, A. M. Giakas1, A. Morozov1, P. Michel3 et al.

M. R. Edwards2,§ and J. M. Mikhailova1,∥

  • *These authors contributed equally to this work.
  • †Contact author: michelle.wang@princeton.edu
  • ‡Contact author: vpr11@stanford.edu
  • §Contact author: mredwards@stanford.edu
  • ∥Contact author: j.mikhailova@princeton.edu
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Phys. Rev. Applied 26, 054022 – Published 6 November, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/9q15-5b5w

Abstract

We demonstrate efficient diffraction of intense ultrashort laser pulses using optical-field-ionization-induced plasma-neutral gratings formed by spatially structured ionization of a neutral molecular gas in the interference field of two femtosecond pump pulses. The transient refractive index modulation of the plasma structure persists for at least 10 ps and is used to diffract intense femtosecond signal pulses into the first order of diffraction with an average efficiency of up to 35%. Plasma gratings are shown to provide stable diffraction at signal laser intensities greater than 1014  W/cm2, exceeding the damage thresholds of conventional solid-state optics by more than two orders of magnitude, continuously for at least one hour at a 10-Hz repetition rate. The experimental diffraction efficiency scales with the grating aperture allowing for a larger millimeter-scale plasma optic, increases with the pump energy and electron density, and reaches a maximum at a specific grating length in agreement with the coupled-mode theory for periodic media. These results demonstrate the scalability, tunability, and high damage threshold of transmissive plasma-based photonic structures, opening new prospects for controlling multi-petawatt laser beams.

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Phys. Rev. Applied 26, 054022– Published 6 November, 2026
  • Received 29 April 2026
  • Accepted 29 September 2026
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI.

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