Collisional absorption of dense plasmas in strong laser fields: quantum statistical results and simulation

Collisional absorption of dense fully ionized plasmas in strong laser fields is investigated using quantum statistical methods as well as molecular dynamics simulations. For high-frequency fields, quantum statistical expressions for the electrical current density and the electron-ion collision frequency are presented. Strong correlations are taken into account and their influence on the absorption rate is discussed. The expressions are valid for arbitrary field strength assuming the nonrelativistic case. In addition, molecular dynamics simulations were performed to calculate the heating of dense plasmas in laser fields. Comparisons with the analytic results for different plasma parameters are given. There are considered the cases of isothermal plasmas as well as two-temperature plasmas. Furthermore, results for the velocity distribution function under the influence of intense laser fields are presented which show a different behavior in comparison to weak fields.