This is for comparison's sake only. This is by all means not cooler than trapping particles.

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Scott and I made plasma today. It was a similar experience to the first time man made fire.

This was with 5058 mW average power from the laser, attenuated to 40%, 100kHz repetition rate, ~500fs pulses, focused through a 20x objective with NA of 0.4:

100x Objective worked as well, but the focal point is inside the edge of the metal casing of the lens. We got plasma with 10x but had to turn the power up almost all the way. Based on this, a NA of at least 0.25 is needed to make plasma at this power. NA 0.4 gives more headroom with power.

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