Triggering and guiding electric discharge by a train of UV picosecond pulses combined with a long UV pulse

Non-self-sustained electric discharge and electric breakdown were triggered and guided by a train of picosecond UV pulses overlapped with a long free-running UV pulse of a hybrid Ti:Sapphire-KrF laser facility. Photocurrent sustained by this train is two orders of magnitude higher, and electric breakdown distance is twice longer than those for the discharge triggered by the long UV pulse only.