As a guest user you are not logged in or recognized by your IP address. You have
access to the Front Matter, Abstracts, Author Index, Subject Index and the full
text of Open Access publications.
The following lecture notes offer a short, elementary introduction to the field of high-intensity laser interactions with matter. The material starts with basic phenomena such as ionization, plasma characterization and thresholds for non-linear behaviour. In the latter sections, topics relevant to laser-based particle acceleration are covered in detail, including wave propagation in underdense plasmas and fast electron heating in overdense (solid) plasmas. The notes are concluded with a short summary of plasma simulation techniques, including a work-through tutorial using a particle-in-cell code.