About NSF OPAL
NSF OPAL (Optical Parametric Amplifier Line) is designed to be a next-generation laser user facility at the University of Rochester’s Laboratory for Laser Energetics (LLE). Once built, its two 25-petawatt lasers are expected to make it the most powerful laser system in the world.
NSF OPAL is designed to unlock mysteries about the universe under extreme conditions — using lasers to recreate the electromagnetic fields, temperatures, and pressures otherwise found only in the most extreme parts of the cosmos. It could even run physics in reverse: where fusion experiments convert mass into energy, NSF OPAL experiments may someday demonstrate the opposite, turning laser energy directly into matter.
The discoveries this enables are expected to deepen understanding of fundamental physics while driving innovations that could show up much closer to home: the optics NSF OPAL develops are designed to have direct impacts on next-generation lasers for advanced semiconductor and industrial manufacturing and medical applications — from cancer diagnosis and treatment to new medical isotopes to material inspection using x-ray and gamma-ray sources.
In a nutshell
NSF OPAL is designed to take on some of physics’ most persistent open questions:
- How plasmas can be manipulated to produce particles at extreme energies in far less space than today’s accelerators require
- What happens when light becomes intense enough to interact with the vacuum and create matter
- How the behavior of matter under extreme pressures affects the formation and evolution of planets and stars.
The research is also expected to drive technology advances with uses well beyond the lab, from national security to medicine, and to train the scientists and engineers who will build and run future research facilities. Built to serve the global research community for decades, NSF OPAL is intended to keep the United States at the frontier of ultrahigh-peak-power, ultrafast laser science.
Reaching ultrahigh intensities
Each of the facility’s two lasers is designed to reach 25 petawatts using optical parametric chirped-pulse amplification (OPCPA). Optical Parametric Amplification transfers energy from one type of laser pulse into another. That technique builds on chirped-pulse amplification (CPA), the Nobel Prize–winning invention developed at LLE in 1985.
CPA creates the ultrashort extremely high-energy laser pulses in the NSF OPAL laser system.
FAQs
The most extreme conditions in nature, such as those inside stars, near black holes, and in the first moments of the universe, are nearly impossible to study directly. NSF OPAL is designed to recreate some of those conditions in a laboratory, giving scientists a way to test fundamental physics that is currently out of reach.
NSF OPAL is also designed to advance U.S. leadership in ultrahigh-intensity laser science. Building it will advance optics and laser technologies with uses in national security, fundamental science, fusion energy, manufacturing, and medicine, and will train the scientists and engineers who will design and operate the next generation of research facilities.
The project was awarded the first round of funding from the US National Science Foundation (NSF) to advance the NSF OPAL project into its final design phase. The funding advances the proposed scientific research facility another major step toward construction. Construction at the University of Rochester’s Laboratory for Laser Energetics (LLE) would follow with future funding.
Initial design and prototyping of key technologies was awarded by NSF in 2023 (Award No. PHY-2329970), and in 2026, the project was awarded initial funding for the Final Design Phase (Award No. PHY-2627873).
Jonathan Zuegel, a distinguished scientist at LLE and professor of optics at the University of Rochester, leads the NSF OPAL project as principal investigator and project director.
Partner institutions include the University at Buffalo; University of California, Berkeley; University of California, Irvine; University of Notre Dame; University of Maryland; University of Michigan; The Ohio State University; and Plymouth Grating Laboratory.
Principal Investigators | Project Team
Activities supported under the final design award span five institutions: the University of Rochester, the University at Buffalo, the University of California, Irvine, the University of Notre Dame, and Plymouth Grating Laboratory.
Four Frontier Science Working Groups, made up of researchers from partner institutions and the broader user community, shape NSF OPAL’s experimental program:
- Particle Acceleration and Advanced Light Sources: Generating particles and special forms of light by way of dynamic manipulation of plasmas.
- High-Field Physics and Quantum Electrodynamics: Testing what happens when light is intense enough to “break the vacuum” and push a well-established theory to its limits.
- Laboratory Astrophysics and Planetary Physics: Recreating the conditions inside planets and stars.
- Laser-Driven Nuclear Physics: Using lasers to drive nuclear reactions and trace how the elements formed.
A petawatt is one quadrillion (1,000,000,000,000,000) watts. Each of NSF OPAL’s two lasers is designed to reach 25 petawatts. Combined, that is thousands of times the average power used by the entire world, but delivered in extremely short pulses lasting only a tiny fraction of a second. Focusing that power onto a very small spot is what produces the extreme conditions NSF OPAL is designed to study.
Combined with the shot rate and experimental flexibility built into its design, NSF OPAL isn’t a scaled-up version of existing lasers — it’s designed to be a fundamentally different kind of facility, one built for sustained research campaigns instead of single demonstration shots.
NSF OPAL is designed to be co-located with LLE’s existing OMEGA EP beamlines, it doesn’t need to build an entirely new laser complex from scratch: the design is built around a smaller physical footprint than a standalone facility would require, while still reaching 2×25 PW peak power.
Building NSF OPAL requires advances in high-energy amplifiers, large-aperture optics, and diagnostics. These technologies also apply to next-generation lasers for national security, fusion energy, semiconductor and industrial manufacturing, and medicine. The project works with U.S. industry partners to develop these components and strengthen the domestic supply chain.
AI and machine learning are being built into the facility’s experiment planning, operations, and data analysis from the start, making NSF OPAL among the first major scientific user facilities to build AI/ML into its core design.
NSF OPAL will be based at the University of Rochester’s Laboratory for Laser Energetics (LLE), a unique national resource for science and a leading center for laser research
and development. This co-location leverages existing infrastructure, including the OMEGA EP laser system, as well as associated experimental and diagnostics systems
along with proven expertise in laser engineering, target fabrication and metrology, and user-facility operations.
By leveraging current scientific infrastructure in Rochester, including the Omega Laser Facility, NSF OPAL provides a cost-effective means to access new areas of frontier
science on a practical timeline.
NSF OPAL is designed to be a place for learning and collaboration as well as discovery. Students, researchers, and industry partners will have hands-on opportunities in fundamental research and technology development, working on what is expected to be the most powerful laser system in the world.
That experience is intended to prepare scientists, engineers, and technicians for careers in high-tech industry, national laboratories, and universities. By working with regional innovation hubs such as the NSF STELLAR Engine, NSF OPAL is also intended to help turn scientific advances into economic growth and jobs, strengthening U.S. competitiveness in laser-based science and technologies.