In this, the second issue of volume 26, Laser and Particle Beams publishes 19 articles related to the topics of laser matter interaction, high energy density physics (HED), generation of short wavelength radiation and X-ray lasers and related applications. Since a number of years, these are the topics that carry most of the momentum in our field, which is clearly demonstrated by the growing number of references to articles in this field (Badziak et al., Reference Badziak, Glowacz, Hora, Jablonski and Wolowski2006; Bashir et al., Reference Bashir, Rafique and Ul-Haq2007; Batani et al., Reference Batani, Dezulian, Redaelli, Benocci, Stabile, Canova, Desai, Lucchini, Krousky, Masek, Pfeifer, Skala, Dudzak, Rus, Ullschmied, Malka, Faure, Koenig, Limpouch, Nazarov, Pepler, Nagai, Norimatsu and Nishimura2007; Beilis, Reference Beilis2007; Borghesi et al., Reference Borghesi, Kar, Romagnani, Toncian, Antici, Audebert, Brambrink, Ceccherini, Cecchetti, Fuchs, Galimberti, Gizzi, Grismayer, Lyseikina, Jung, Macchi, Mora, Osterholtz, Schiavi and Willi2007; Brambrink et al., Reference Brambrink, Roth, Blazevic and Schlegel2006; Flippo et al., Reference Flippo, Hegelich, Albright, Yin, Gautier, Letzring, Schollmeier, Schreiber, Schulze and Fernandez2007; Glowacz et al., Reference Glowacz, Hora, Badziak, Jablonski, Cang and Osman2006; Gupta & Suk, Reference Gupta and Suk2007; Hora, Reference Hora2007; Kappe et al., Reference Kappe, Strasser and Ostermeyer2007; Koyama et al., Reference Koyama, Adachi, Miura, Kato, Masuda, Watanabe, Ogata and Tanimoto2006; Lifschitz et al., Reference Lifschitz, Faure, Glinec, Malka and Mora2006; Liu et al., Reference Liu, Zhan, Zhang, Liu, Feng, Shu, Zhang and Wang2007; Mangles et al., Reference Mangles, Walton, Najmudin, Dangor, Krushelnick, Malka, Manclossi, Lopes, Carias, Mendes and Dorchies2006; Meister et al., Reference Meister, Riesbeck and Eichler2007; Ozaki et al., Reference Ozaki, Bom, Ganeev, Kieffer, Suzuki and Kuroda2007; Piriz et al., Reference Piriz, Cela, Serena Moreno, Tahir and Hoffmann2006; TahirKim et al., Reference Tahir, Kim, Lomonosov, Grigoriev, Piriz, Weick, Geissel and Hoffmann2007a, Reference Tahir, Spiller, Shutov, Lomonosov, Gryaznov, Piriz, Wouchuk, Deutsch, Fortov, Hoffmann and Schmidt2007b; Thareja & Sharma, Reference Thareja and Sharma2006; Yin et al., Reference Yin, Albright, Hegelich and Fernandez2006)
In September of this year, the XXX European Conference of Laser Interaction with Matter will be held in Darmstadt, Germany. This is probably the conference with the longest tradition in the field of laser interaction with matter and application toward inertial fusion energy. This year the Laser and Particle Beams editorial board will closely collaborate with the organizers of the conference and we envision carrying a large number of original research papers that will be submitted to Laser and Particle Beams in connection with this conference. As part of our publication policy, this journal will not publish proceedings, but we offer to publish carefully selected papers that meet the standards of Laser and Particle Beams, following the tradition of previous conferences. Conference attendees will receive a special offer for volume 27 of Laser and Particle Beams where all selected papers from the XXX ECLIM will be published.
Thus the conference continues a traditional series of meetings that started in Frascati, Italy (1966). Recent conference sites have been in Prague (2000), Moscow (2002), Rome (2004), and Madrid (2006). The conference this year in Darmstadt will address the whole range of topics that are relevant to Laser and Particle Beams and they will include: Diagnostics, Equation of State, High Power Lasers and Ignition Facilities, Hot-Dense Matter, Plasma Atomic Processes, Hydrodynamics and Hydro-Instabilities, Inertial Fusion Energy-Fast Ignition, Targets, and Reactors, Innovative Laser Drivers, Laboratory Astrophysics, Laser Acceleration, Laser- and Ion Beam Interaction with Matter, Short-Pulse Lasers, and X-ray Lasers. We are looking forward to meeting you in Darmstadt and to welcome you to our reception.