Positron Production in Multiphoton Light-by-Light Scattering

Journal Article · Mon Sep 01 04:00:00 EDT 1997 · Physical Review Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.79.1626· OSTI ID:664459

Burke, D L; Field, R C; Horton-Smith, G; Spencer, J E; Walz, D ^[1]; Berridge, S C; Bugg, W M; Shmakov, K; Weidemann, A W ^[2]; Bula, C; McDonald, K T; Prebys, E J ^[3]; Bamber, C; Boege, S J; Koffas, T; Kotseroglou, T; Melissinos, A C; Meyerhofer, D D; Reis, D A; Ragg, W ^[4]

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1. Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94309 (United States)
2. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tennessee 37996 (United States)
3. Joseph Henry Laboratories, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey 08544 (United States)
4. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Rochester, Rochester, New York 14627 (United States)

A signal of 106{plus_minus}14 positrons above background has been observed in collisions of a low-emittance 46.6GeV electron beam with terawatt pulses from a Nd:glass laser at 527nm wavelength in an experiment at the Final Focus Test Beam at SLAC. The positrons are interpreted as arising from a two-step process in which laser photons are backscattered to GeV energies by the electron beam followed by a collision between the high-energy photon and several laser photons to produce an electron-positron pair. These results are the first laboratory evidence for inelastic light-by-light scattering involving only real photons. {copyright} {ital 1997} {ital The American Physical Society}

• Research Organization: Stanford Linear Accelerator Center
• DOE Contract Number: AC03-76SF00515; FG02-91ER40671; FG02-91ER40685; FG02-91ER40627
• OSTI ID: 664459
• Journal Information: Physical Review Letters, Journal Name: Physical Review Letters Journal Issue: 9 Vol. 79; ISSN 0031-9007; ISSN PRLTAO
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

66 PHYSICS
ELECTRON BEAMS
LIGHT SCATTERING
PAIR PRODUCTION
PARTICLE PRODUCTION
PHOTON-PHOTON INTERACTIONS
POSITRONS
SIGNALS
WAVELENGTHS