Laser cleaning of diagnostic mirrors from tokamak-like carbon contaminants

This paper presents a laboratory-scale experimental investigation of laser cleaning of diagnostic First Mirrors (FMs). Redeposition of contaminants sputtered from tokamak first wall onto FMs surface could dramatically decrease their reflectivity in an unacceptable way for the functioning of the plasma diagnostic systems. Laser cleaning is a promising solution to tackle this issue. In this work, pulsed laser deposition was exploited to produce rhodium films functional as FMs and to deposit onto them carbon contaminants with tailored features, resembling those found in tokamaks. The same laser system was also used to perform laser cleaning experiments by means of a sample handling procedure that allows to clean some cm(2) in few minutes. The cleaning effectiveness was evaluated in terms of specular reflectivity recovery and mirror surface integrity. The effect of different laser wavelengths (lambda = 1064, 266 nm) on the cleaning process is also addressed.