Interaction of intense laser pulses with atomic clusters

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

We examine the interaction of intense, femtosecond laser radiation with the large (50--200 {}) clusters produced in pulsed gas jets. Both experiment and simulation show that the plasmas produced during these interactions exhibit electron temperatures far in excess of that predicted by above-threshold ionization theory for a low-density gas. Efficient heating of the clusters by the laser is followed by rapid expansion of the clusters and long-lived x-ray emission from hot, decaying, underdense plasma. {} 1996 The American Physical Society.