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Dynamics of large femtosecond filament arrays: possibilities, limitations, and trade-offs

Stable propagation of large, multifilament arrays over long distances in air paves new ways for microwave-radiation manipulation. Although, the dynamics of a single or a few filaments was discussed in some of the previous studies, we show that the stability of large plasma filament arrays is significantly more complicated and is constrained by several trade-offs. Here, we analyze the stability properties of rectangular arrays as a function of four parameters: relative phase of the generating beams, number of filaments, separation between them, and initial power. We find that arrays with alternating phase of filaments are more stable than similar arrays with all beams in phase. Additionally, we show that increasing the size of an array increases its stability, and that a proper choice of the beam separation and the initial power has to be made in order to obtain a dense and regular array of filaments.