Colin Danson gives the opening welcome address virtually to the delegates of HPLSE2021.
The 4th in the series of High Power Laser Science and Engineering Symposia, HPLSE2021, was held between 12-16 April 2021 in Suzhou, China. This was a mixed live and virtual conference with Chinese delegates able to meet in Suzhou with non-Chinese participants inputting virtually. Colin Danson co-chaired the conference together with Prof Xian-Tu He (CAEP) and Prof Dianyuan Fan (SIOM and Shenzhen University).
There were nine international plenary talks from an impressive line-up of senior members of the community from around the globe: USA (Prof Mike Campbell), Japan (Prof Ryosuki Kodama), ELI-NP (Dr Olivier Chalus), China (Prof Jie Zhang, Prof Xian-Tu He, and Prof Jianqiang Zhu); there were three plenary talks from the UK, all members of OxCHEDS: Justin Wark, High Energy Density Science with X-ray Free Electron Lasers; Peter Norreys, Prospects for high gain for Inertial Fusion Energy; and Colin Danson, Petawatt and Exawatt Class Lasers Worldwide.
The conference was divided into different sessions covering: High Energy Density Science; High Power Laser Systems; Laser Components for High Power Lasers; and Advanced Laser Technologies and Applications, with a mixture of invited and contributed talks and posters. The virtual presentations will be available on-line in mid-May.
There is a special issue of the journal High Power Laser Science and Engineering for peer reviewed papers with the call on the Cambridge University Press website: