The Intense Laser Matter Interactions Lab at the University of Maryland explores topics in high intensity laser plasma interactions, laser-based acceleration of charged particles, nonlinear optics, high power beam propagation, remote sensing and generation and applications of structured light. 

The lab has a wide range of laser systems, including:

• Ti:Sapphire based systems of peak power 10 TW and 25 TW, with the latter system soon to be upgraded to 100 TW. These systems are applied to experiments in high peak power nonlinear propagation and filamentation in gases and to laser wakefield acceleration.
• Mid-IR ultrashort pulse OPCPA laser system, the highest energy at this wavelength in the US: 30 mJ/pulse, 80 fs pulsewidth, l=3.9 µm. Applied to experiments in nonlinear optics, laser-driven acceleration, THz and RF generation, plasma gratings, and ultrasensitive charge detection.
• Two 1 kHz Ti:Sapphire based systems: 4 mJ/pulse and 11 mJ/pulse. Applied to experiments in nonlinear optics (using OPA and DFG for mid-IR and long wave-IR pulse generation), kHz rep. rate laser wakefield acceleration, and the generation and study of spatio-temporal optical vortices (STOVs).
• CO₂ laser system 3 J, ~100 ns. Applied to experiments in propagation, laser driven avalanche, and remote detection of radioactive sources