Advanced Research · West Linn, Oregon
Rolice Labs develops the simulation infrastructure, control architecture, and diagnostic frameworks that make the next generation of laser plasma research possible — and safe.
"The gap between what ultrafast laser systems can do in theory and what researchers can safely, reproducibly control in practice — that gap is where we work."
Rolice Labs — Research Mission Statement
The Problem
When a femtosecond pulse propagates through air at sufficient intensity, it doesn't just illuminate — it transforms the medium. The nonlinear interaction between the optical field and neutral air molecules produces a self-guided plasma channel: a column of ionized gas tens of centimeters to meters in length, conducting, transient, and exquisitely sensitive to initial conditions.
The physics are well-understood at the textbook level. The challenge — the one that has kept laser plasma diagnostics from reaching their potential — is control. How do you tune a system with nanosecond-scale plasma lifetimes, shot-to-shot stochastic variability, and four coupled actuator dimensions, in real time, without a validated simulation framework to design from?
You don't. Not reliably. Not yet. That's the problem Rolice Labs exists to solve.
What's At Stake
What We Build
Our research program develops three interlocking capabilities. Each is useful alone. Together, they form the foundation for a new class of reproducible laser plasma diagnostic tools.
We have built a reduced-order surrogate calibrated to the Coherent Astrella Ti:Sapphire system operating at 800 nm, sub-35 femtosecond pulse duration, and 7 millijoules per pulse. The model predicts channel onset position, effective length, peak intensity, and normalized plasma conductivity from four actuator inputs. Mean absolute error under 20 centimeters across the full operating range. Designed for high-throughput uncertainty propagation campaigns.
The published literature has no validated closed-loop control architecture for laser-induced plasma channel parameters. We have built one. A gain-scheduled PID controller with effective error blending — channel length tracking plus soft penalties for onset position and peak intensity — regulates the plasma channel in real time. A neural surrogate controller trained on PID rollouts provides a compact learned policy alternative. Both enforce the safety envelope by design.
Real laser systems don't operate in perfect laboratory conditions. Atmospheric variability, shot-to-shot noise, thermal drift, and gas composition fluctuations all degrade measurement reproducibility. Our uncertainty framework propagates these sources through the full simulation, producing calibrated confidence intervals on all observables. This is the infrastructure that transforms a promising result into a publishable, reproducible one.
The Larger Picture
The history of science is full of enabling technologies — tools that weren't themselves the discovery, but that made the discovery possible. The laser was one. The CCD detector was another. Validated, open simulation frameworks for laser plasma diagnostics are next.
Every group running ultrafast laser plasma experiments needs to know: what happens when I change the chirp? How does humidity affect my onset position? What is the real uncertainty on my conductivity measurement? Today, they answer these questions empirically, expensively, and often dangerously. Rolice Labs is building the infrastructure that lets them answer them computationally, first.
The downstream applications are numerous and span civilian, scientific, and national security domains. We do not discuss specifics. We design our tools to be useful across that full range — which means designing them to be rigorous, validated, and safe at every layer.
The Team
We are a small, focused team. That is intentional. The work we do requires deep expertise, not headcount. Every person here is a principal — accountable for outcomes, not just tasks.
Principal Investigator
Leads all scientific and technical work. Expertise in ultrafast laser physics, plasma diagnostics, closed-loop control systems, and scientific software development.
Managing Member
Leads business operations, financial management, federal compliance, and grant administration. Majority owner and controlling member of Rolice International, LLC. Primary authority on banking, contracts, and administrative matters.
Let's Talk
"The right conversation at the right moment changes everything."
We welcome inquiries from federal program officers, agency scientists, and potential collaborators. We respond to every substantive message personally. If you are a program manager at a federal agency and you want to understand what we are doing and why — reach out. We will make time.