Fig. 1. Inside the pulse compressor of the NOVA Petawatt – the first petawatt class laser worldwide (picture courtesy of LLNL).

Fig. 2. The Vulcan Petawatt Target Hall (picture courtesy of STFC).

Fig. 3. One of the Orion pulse compressor gratings (picture courtesy of AWE).

Fig. 4. Omega EP beamlines (picture courtesy of LLE).

Fig. 5. The Gekko XII and LFEX lasers at ILE, University of Osaka, Japan (picture courtesy of Osaka University).

Fig. 6. A technician inside the NIF target chamber (picture courtesy of LLNL).

Fig. 7. The LMJ facility in Bordeaux, France (picture courtesy of CEA).

Fig. 8. The first Ti:sapphire petawatt class laser facility J-KAREN, Japan (picture courtesy of JAEA).

Fig. 9. The APRI Petawatt Facility at GIST, South Korea (picture courtesy of GIST).

Fig. 10. BELLA, the highest repetition rate petawatt class laser in the world (picture courtesy of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory).

Fig. 11. The SIOM OPCPA Qiangguang 10 PW laser facility (picture courtesy of SIOM).

Fig. 12. The final amplifier of POLARIS (picture courtesy of Helmholtz Institute).

Fig. 13. Artist’s impression of the ELI-Beamlines building (picture courtesy of ELI).