| Abstract: | The generation of megagauss magnetic field due to the time dependent part of the ponderomotive force of a self-focused Gaussian laser beam indicent on a plasma has been studied. Defocusing of the laser beam becomes possible due to diffraction divergence in the case of a weakly nonlinear medium. The influence of defocusing of a laser beam on magnetic field generation has also been investigated. It is found that the magnitude of the magnetic field due to self focusing of the beam is enhanced and is comparable with the observed values, while there is a reduction in the magnitude of the magnetic field when the beam defocuses due to diffraction divergence in the presence of weak nonlinearity. |
