The chirped-pulse inverse free-electron laser: A high-gradient vacuum laser accelerator
- Institute for Laser Science and Applications, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, California 94550 (United States)
- Department of Applied Science, University of California, Davis, California 95616 (United States)
- Center for Theoretical Physics and Physics Department, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139 (United States)
- DULY Research Inc., Rancho Palos Verdes, California 90275 (United States)
The inverse free-electron laser (IFEL) interaction is studied theoretically and computationally in the case where the drive laser intensity approaches the relativistic regime, and the pulse duration is only a few optical cycles long. The IFEL concept has been demonstrated as a viable vacuum laser acceleration process; it is shown here that by using an ultrashort, ultrahigh-intensity drive laser pulse, the IFEL interaction bandwidth and accelerating gradient are increased considerably, thus yielding large energy gains. Using a chirped pulse and negative dispersion focusing optics allows one to take further advantage of the laser optical bandwidth and produce a chromatic line focus maximizing the gradient. The combination of these novel ideas results in a compact vacuum laser accelerator capable of accelerating picosecond electron bunches with a high gradient (GeV/m) and very low energy spread. {copyright} {ital 1999 American Institute of Physics.}
- OSTI ID:
- 686547
- Journal Information:
- Physics of Plasmas, Vol. 6, Issue 10; Other Information: PBD: Oct 1999
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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