Effects of pre-pulse current on Ne-like Ar laser at 72.6 nm excited by capillary discharge

At present, research on the capillary discharge plasma Ne-like Ar 72.6 nm laser is insufficient, and additional experimental studies are supposed to determine the experimental parameters of the laser. Thus the effects of the pre-pulse current and the delay time between pre-pulse and main-pulse on the 72.6 nm laser are investigated in this paper. Before the experiments, the plasma parameters during the Z-pinch process were simulated. We employed 3.2 mm inner diameter capillaries with 35 cm and 45 cm lengths in the experiment. The experiment was conducted with the main-pulse current amplitude of 17.5 kA, the initial Ar pressure of 14–21 Pa, the pre-pulse and main-pulse delay time of 3.5–54.5 μs, and the pre-pulse current amplitude of 9.0–66.8 A. The intensity of the 72.6 nm laser was measured with different experimental parameters. The experimental results indicate that the intensity of 72.6 nm laser is maximum with the initial Ar pressure of 16 Pa, the pre-pulse and main-pulse delay time of 20 μs, and the pre-pulse current amplitude of 18.4 A in the 45 cm long capillary.