Stochastic pulsation of laser-plasma interaction in the range of a few to dozens of picoseconds, due to standing wave produced density ripples, needs more attention than in the past, in view of the recent developments. This is important if nanosecond laser pulses produce a pre-compression that is a thousand times the solid state density of DT for fast ignition as well as for treatment of ps laser interaction. The following is an updated summary of these properties where the laser beam smoothing is essential. The use of smoothing is not only an empirical game with experiments for improving the interaction, but it is necessary to be aware of the mechanisms involved for understanding how the pulsation is overcome, and conclusions can be derived systematically for further improvements and control of the phenomena.

In this paper we present the analytical description of two processes dealing with the skin-layer ponderomotive acceleration method of fast ion generation by a short laser pulse: ion density rippling in the underdense plasma region and generation of ion beams by trapped electromagnetic field in plasma. Some numerical examples of hydrodynamic simulation illustrating these processes are shown. The effect of using the laser pulse consisting of different frequency components on the ion density rippling and on phenomena connected with trapped electromagnetic field is analyzed.

In this paper the results of numerical computations of rippling smoothing basing on the broad-band laser irradiation method for the laser intensity range 1016−1017 W/cm2 and short-pulse (<10 ps) interaction with plasma are described.