Extensive comparison among Target Normal Sheath Acceleration theoretical models

During the last 10 years of research it has been experimentally demonstrated that ions can be accelerated up to energies of tens of MeV as a consequence of the ultra-intense laser pulse interaction with a solid target. This process has been shown to take place via the so-called Target Normal Sheath Acceleration (TNSA) mechanism. A fundamental challenge in the investigation of this phenomenon is to understand the dependencies of the ion beam features on the laser and target properties. In order to achieve this goal, several TNSA theoretical models have been proposed. In the present work a collection of maximum ion energies experimentally measured has been compared to the values predicted by six different theoretical descriptions. The models we chose to compare are based either on a fluid approach, on a quasi-static approach, or on a combination of the before-mentioned. On the basis of such a quantitative comparison we aim to provide a reliable test of these theoretical descriptions, in which their strengths, weaknesses, open problems and capability in predicting the ion energy are underlined. © 2011 Elsevier B.V.