A survey of stable and long--lived nuclei as well as nuclear isomers looknig for candidates of studies of low--energy (1--30~keV) nuclear excitation by laser--produced plasma radiation. We concentrate on medium--size high--power lasers with pulse duration of hundreds of~ps providing energy up to 1000~J and subrelativistic intensity of 10^{16}-10^{17}Wcm^{-2}. Screening criteria are primarily the transition energy and the half--life, spin and parity of nuclear levels. 181Ta is suggested as first candidate for which an estimation of reaction efficiency is included.