The influence of temporal pulse shaping on plasma plume generated by ultrafast laser irradiation of aluminum is investigated. Time resolved plasma emission spectroscopy is coupled with a temporal shaping procedure in a closed loop. The ionic emission is enhanced relative to the neutral one via an adaptive optimization strategy. The plasma emission efficiency in case of optimized and ultrashort temporal shapes of the laser pulses are compared, evidencing an enhancement of the ionization degree of the plasma plume. Simplified temporal shapes of the femtosecond laser pulses are extracted from the optimized shape and their corresponding effect on laser induced plasma emission is discussed. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.