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Informatics Colloquium 24. 4. 2018, 14:00 lecture hall D2 Kateřina Falk, Ph.D., Helmholtz Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, Drážďany, Německo Astrophysics and fusion research with high power lasers The most powerful laser systems in the world and their uses Abstract: The talk will be about speaker research on dense plasmas using some of the most powerful lasers in the world. At the first an outline of the field will be given, including an introduction of some of the best laser laboratories and about applications in laboratory astrophysics and fusion technology. Thanks to the development of high power and high energy lasers, scientists are now able to generate extreme states of matter, accelerate particles and simulate many astrophysical phenomena including the interiors of planets, supernova explosions, gigantic astrophysical jets or even create antimatter. By dynamically compressing matter, lasers can create exotic phase transitions like the diamond rain inside Neptune or formation of rare structures like londsdaleite, which is harder than diamond. One of the most important applications of this research is an efficient generation of clean energy using thermonuclear fusion, the same reactions that power all stars including our Sun.