Kinetic effects during the interaction between high density microplasma and electromagnetic wave*

The interaction between a high-density microplasma and high-power electromagnetic wave is studied by one-dimensional Particle-in-Cell Monte Carlo collisions model coupled with the Maxwell's equations. We find the value of the amplitude of the wave field above which a fully ionized plasma is generated on the picosecond time scale. This fully ionized plasma is obtained only in the skin layer while the ionization degree of the plasma bulk is \textasciitilde 20{\%}. The simulation results show that such non-homogeneous distribution of plasma and gas density influences significantly the heating of plasma electrons and time evolution of the electron energy distribution function.