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Ultrashort pulse lasers focused in air result in plasma filaments that generate ultra-broadband secondary radiation that ranges from the megahertz to terahertz. The plasma currents responsible for the broadband radiation are the ponderomotive for the terahertz regime and the plasma wake surface wave (PWSW) for the gigahertz regime. Through experimental studies, I explore the optimization of microwave regime (1 - 67 GHz) of the spectrum. The experiments consider the effects of background gas and pressure in the filamentation region, pulse length of the laser, and wavelength of the laser on the plasma currents that produce the broadband radiated pulse. The results of the first experiment suggest that reduction of the electron-neutral collisions permits the growth of the PWSW and improve microwave amplitude. The second experiment demonstrates a growth in resulting microwave signal as a result of collisional processes driven by longer pulse durations. The final experiment demonstrates and order of magnitude increase in the microwave field amplitudes when the wavelength of a picosecond scale, terawatt class laser pulse is increased from 1.035 microns to 9.2 microns.

Design and implementation of the plasma control system Mgr. Filip Janky The COMPASS tokamak was recommissioned in 2007 and it needed new digital controllers for its experimental research. This thesis presents the design and imple- mentation of control of main plasma parameters such as plasma current, plasma position, plasma shape and electron density. Improved plasma current control with resetting set points suppresses overshooting and thus increases the length of the flat top phase. A method for estimating the plasma position, gain tuning for the controller and decreasing latencies and delays to obtain robust position control are presented. Lower delays improve plasma stability and decrease the frequency of disruptions. The plasma shape controller is a feedforward controller with a method to suppress oscillations which are coming from mutual inductance between power supplies controlling plasma horizontal position, plasma shape and plasma current, which all use the same coil. Averaged electron density is corrected in real-time according to the interferometer line of sight and a non-linearity of measurement. Controllers and their improvements described here, played a major role in achiev- ing H-mode scenario and fulfilling the experimental program. Keywords: tokamak, plasma current control, plasma position...