After brief introduction of the speaker?$B!G?(Js research history, the outline and features of the intense laser facility and the research activities at the Institute for Chemical Research (ICR), Kyoto University are introduced. The recent studies of the intense femtosecond laser interaction with solid targets and generation & acceleration of electrons and its applications are presented.
Electron beams are useful to explore the matter structure because of their large elastic scattering cross-section, small non-elastic scattering loss, and high sensitivity to electromagnetic field. Therefore, to observe ultrafast changes in the atomic-scale structure of matter and in the electromagnetic fields during physical phenomena, time-resolved electron diffraction and deflection using short electron-pulses are useful techniques. A key issue to realize single-shot ultrafast electron diffraction and deflection is the development of intense short electron-pulse sources.?$B!!?(JElectrons accelerated by intense femtosecond laser pulses are promising for intense short electron-pulse sources. We have been studying the physics of electron emission during and after laser-plasma interactions to develop higher intensity electron pulses. Compression of a laser-accelerated electron beam has been successfully demonstrated to be as short as 80 fs (@350KeV), and by the deflection with these compressed electron-pulses, we have observed an intense THz surface (Sommerfeld) wave traveling along the wire target induced by an intense laser pulse. Recently, with the presented short electron-pulses, we have observed not only laser-target interaction, but also laser pulse focusing in vacuum.