Nonlinear Collisional Absorption of Laser Light in Dense Strongly Coupled Plasmas

We present a new theoretical approach for collisional absorption of laser energy in dense plasmas which accommodates arbitrary frequencies and high intensities of the laser field by establishing a connection between laser absorption by inverse bremsstrahlung and the stopping power for ions. This relation is then applied to include strong correlations beyond the mean field approach. The results show excellent agreement with molecular dynamics simulations up to very high coupling strength.