Quasi-monoenergetic laser-plasma acceleration of electrons to 2 GeV

Laser-plasma accelerators of only a centimetre's length have produced nearly monoenergetic electron bunches with energy as high as 1 GeV. Scaling these compact accelerators to multi-gigaelectronvolt energy would open the prospect of building X-ray free-electron lasers and linear colliders hundr...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nature communications 2013-06, Vol.4 (1), p.1988
Main Authors: Wang, Xiaoming, Zgadzaj, Rafal, Fazel, Neil, Li, Zhengyan, Yi, S A, Zhang, Xi, Henderson, Watson, Chang, Y-Y, Korzekwa, R, Tsai, H-E, Pai, C-H, Quevedo, H, Dyer, G, Gaul, E, Martinez, M, Bernstein, A C, Borger, T, Spinks, M, Donovan, M, Khudik, V, Shvets, G, Ditmire, T, Downer, M C
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS
Science & Technology - Other Topics
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Summary:Laser-plasma accelerators of only a centimetre's length have produced nearly monoenergetic electron bunches with energy as high as 1 GeV. Scaling these compact accelerators to multi-gigaelectronvolt energy would open the prospect of building X-ray free-electron lasers and linear colliders hundreds of times smaller than conventional facilities, but the 1 GeV barrier has so far proven insurmountable. Here, by applying new petawatt laser technology, we produce electron bunches with a spectrum prominently peaked at 2 GeV with only a few per cent energy spread and unprecedented sub-milliradian divergence. Petawatt pulses inject ambient plasma electrons into the laser-driven accelerator at much lower density than was previously possible, thereby overcoming the principal physical barriers to multi-gigaelectronvolt acceleration: dephasing between laser-driven wake and accelerating electrons and laser pulse erosion. Simulations indicate that with improvements in the laser-pulse focus quality, acceleration to nearly 10 GeV should be possible with the available pulse energy.
ISSN:2041-1723
2041-1723
DOI:10.1038/ncomms2988