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@PHDTHESIS{Braun:643144,
author = {Braun, Cora},
othercontributors = {Maier, Andreas and Kärtner, Franz},
title = {{S}tretcher and {A}mplifier design for the {LPA} {D}rive
{L}asers {ANGUS} and {KALDERA}},
school = {Universität Hamburg},
type = {Dissertation},
address = {Hamburg},
publisher = {Verlag Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY},
reportid = {PUBDB-2026-00042, DESY-THESIS-2025-023},
series = {DESY-THESIS},
pages = {148},
year = {2026},
note = {Dissertation, Universität Hamburg, 2025},
abstract = {Laser-plasma accelerators (LPAs) are a promising technology
to build compact andcost-efficient accelerators for a
variety of applications. To realize this promise,
thereliability and long-term stability of the accelerated
electrons have to be improved.Much of this improvement
relates to the stability of the drive laser. Apart
fromimproving passive stability, increasing the repetition
rate of the laser from a few Hzto >100 Hz, enables the use
of active stabilizations, that can account for many
lowerfrequency contributions from e.g. mechanical vibrations
and air-fluctuations. Theoverarching goal of the thesis is
to develop setups for the Ti:Sa CPA TW-class lasersystems
ANGUS and KALDERA, that allow for a stable laser performance
andacceleration of high-quality electrons.To improve the
long-term stability of the ANGUS laser, a new, more stable
front-end,based on optical-parametric chirped-pulse
amplification (OPCPA) was built. Thisthesis reports on the
design, alignment and characterization of the stretcher,
that wasrequired to integrate the OPCPA front-end into the
laser system. The design goalwas to achieve a stable and
tunable stretcher and to minimize the angular chirp ofthe
output beam by alignment with a three-color-laser. The
characterization of thestretcher and its implementation into
the laser system, which led to the compressionof pulses to
31 fs with sub-percent pulse duration stability will be
presented.With KALDERA a >100Hz repetition rate LPA drive
laser is currently being developedon DESY campus. To
withstand the >100W average power in the final
pulsecompressor, multi-layer dielectric (MLD) gratings need
to be used. This thesis reportson the development, setup and
characterization of a two-transmission grating,
two-passOeffner stretcher, that matches such a MLD
compressor. Using this stretcher, compressionto sub-30 fs
pulse lengths at Ti:Sa wavelength in an out-of-plane
compressorwith MLD gratings could be demonstrated for the
first time. The characterization ofthe output pulses showed
the viability of the stretcher and compressor concept for
theKALDERA laser and other future high-average power, TW, fs
laser systems.To efficiently seed the final amplifiers, a
Booster amplifier is required for the KALDERAlaser. The
designed three-pass Ti:Sa amplifier provides 0.5-1mJ output
energy andsub-percent energy stability. The stretcher and
the Booster amplifier successfully seedthe KALDERA
multi-pass amplifiers to saturation, enabling $sub-0.5\%$
energy stabilityin the final amplifier stage.},
cin = {MPL},
cid = {I:(DE-H253)MPL-20120731},
pnm = {621 - Accelerator Research and Development (POF4-621)},
pid = {G:(DE-HGF)POF4-621},
experiment = {EXP:(DE-H253)LUX-Beamline-20221201},
typ = {PUB:(DE-HGF)3 / PUB:(DE-HGF)11},
urn = {urn:nbn:de:gbv:18-ediss-133887},
doi = {10.3204/PUBDB-2026-00042},
url = {https://bib-pubdb1.desy.de/record/643144},
}