The Second International Conference on the Frontiers of Plasma Physics
and Technology was held in Goa, India, from February 21–25, 2005.
This conference explored a number of fundamental and applied plasma
physics topics. Special attention was focused on the exploration of
frontiers in physics and technology of high energy density plasmas—a
topic growing at a very fast pace due to the emergence of extremely
powerful laser sources. Reviews on activities and new opportunities for
large laser facilities in prominent laboratories of Asia, Europe, and
Canada were presented. Talks on recent advances on laser driven Wakefield
particle acceleration scheme were very exciting. This technology has a
strong potential of revolutionizing the existing accelerator physics,
technology, and radiation sources such as synchrotrons and X-ray
free-electron lasers. Discussions were also given on the generation of
extreme physical conditions similar to those existing in astrophysical
objects, under laboratory conditions using intense lasers. This technique
may lead to an easy and inexpensive way to simulate and understand a
variety of astrophysical phenomena. This aspect of realization of
astrophysical conditions in a laboratory has now become reality, and soon
may lead to routine experiments. New applications of laser in the designs
of light-crafts may soon become reliable.
A number of long existing but still growing and promising plasma
technologies and their recent advances were vigorously discussed. These
technologies have made valuable contributions to the economy all around
the world. Such applications include plasma-assisted coating of fabrics,
mine detection, laser micro-ablation, creation of nano materials of
different structures, preparation of thin films of required hardness,
optical quality, and meteorological studies. These are expected to be
booming cross-disciplinary plasma technology of the future. There were
several presentations on the development of new super-radiant, coherent,
and incoherent radiation sources. Applications and progress of high
harmonic emission and X-ray emission from solids and clusters were
discussed.
Another important topic covered in the conference includes the study
of blast waves in warm dense matter and more generally the interaction of
intense electromagnetic fields with plasma. To explore EOS of matter at
high pressures, a long-thought question, how can we reach states outside
the Hugoniot, was posed? Several suggestions like using porous target
material, pre-compression, a double shock technique, and the use of
release states along with relevant theoretical aspects were vigorously
discussed. The exciting application of plasma physics theory contributing
to our understanding of fundamental particle such as quark-gluon plasma
and spatial photon localization etc… were also presented.
Prospects of future fusion energy technologies like controlled fusion
(laser driven inertial confinement, fast ignition, heavy ion beam fusion,
magnetic confinement schemes like tokomak, stellarators, other hybrid
schemes etc…) were comprehensively discussed and debated. Very high
current charged particle beam propagation in solids, relevant to
high-intensity laser-solid interactions and fast ignition, were explored
by revisiting the Alfven limit. Various important contributions to the
health sciences like painless dentistry, XUV radiation damage threshold,
both single strand and double strand breaking of DNA structure were also
discussed. D. Jaroszynski (UK) and A. Sen (India) reviewed the scientific
activity of the conference.
International advisory committee consisted of D. Batani (Italy), G.
Furlan (Italy), J. Grun (USA), M. H. A. Hassan (Italy), J. Honrubia
(Spain), H. Hora (Australia), P .K. Kaw (India), T. Kawabe (Japan), O.
Khrokin (Russia), A. J. Louzeiro-Malaquias (IAEA), J. T. Mendonca
(Portugal), P. Mulser (Germany), S. Nakai (Japan), N. Rudraiah (India), P.
Sakanaka (Brazil), B. Sinha (India), F. Verheest (Belgium), and J. Zhang
(P.R. China).
Conference was sponsored by Devi Ahilya Vishwa Vidhyalaya (Indore,
India), Institute for Plasma Research (Gandhinagar, India), IUPAP (USA),
IAEA, Laser Technologies Ltd. (St. Petersburg, Russia), National Research
Institute for Applied Mathematics (Bangalore, India), and Universit di
Milano-Bicocca (Milano, Italy). T. Desai, H. C. Pant, A. Sen, and K. P.
Maheshwari directed the conference.
More than 130 delegates from all the continents actively participated
in the conference and about 70 delegates were from overseas. We take this
opportunity to extend our special thanks to all the delegates and authors
for their valuable contribution to the success of the conference. Thirty
papers from this conference will appear in forthcoming issues of Laser
and Particle Beams. Our special thanks are due to referees for their
critical referring of the manuscripts and valuable suggestion. We
earnestly thank Prof. Hoffmann, Editor in chief, Laser and Particle
Beams for careful scrutinizing of the papers of interest to Laser
and Particle Beams readers.
