The laboratory opened on Nov. 4, 2019 between Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics (SIOM), Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Institute of Applied physics (IAP), Russian Academy of Sciences.Yaping Zhang, Vice President of Chinese Academy of Sciences and Alexander Sergeev, President of Russian Academy of Sciences,attended the unveiling ceremony.

Based on different but quite complementary technologies, this joint lab aims to bring together scientists to develop new laser systems; and therefore can ensure the two countries' leading position in research on high field laser physics. It is hoped that high power lasers will allow experiments to create new states of matter, including matter and antimatter in a vacuum.