Related papers: X-ray vacuum diffraction at finite spatio-temporal…
Our goal is to study optical signatures of quantum vacuum nonlinearities in strong macroscopic electromagnetic fields provided by high-intensity laser beams. The vacuum emission scheme is perfectly suited for this task as it naturally…
We study vacuum birefringence and x-ray photon scattering in the head-on collision of x-ray free electron and high-intensity laser pulses. Resorting to analytical approximations for the numbers of attainable signal photons, we analyze the…
Birefringence is one of the fascinating properties of the vacuum of quantum electrodynamics (QED) in strong electromagnetic fields. The scattering of linearly polarized incident probe photons into a perpendicularly polarized mode provides a…
The focus of this article is on providing compact analytical expressions for the differential number of polarization flipped signal photons constituting the signal of vacuum birefringence in the head-on collision of x-ray free electron…
Motivated by recent experimental initiatives, such as at the Helmholtz International Beamline for Extreme Fields (HIBEF) at the European X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL), we calculate the birefringent scattering of x-rays at the combined…
We study x-ray photon scattering in the head-on collision of an XFEL pulse and a focused high-intensity laser pulse, described as paraxial Laguerre-Gaussian beam of arbitrary mode composition. For adequately chosen relative orientations of…
Vacuum birefringence is one of the most striking predictions of strong field quantum electrodynamics: Probe photons traversing a strong field region can indirectly sense the applied "pump" electromagnetic field via quantum fluctuations of…
We study all-optical signatures of the effective nonlinear couplings among electromagnetic fields in the quantum vacuum, using the collision of two focused high-intensity laser pulses as an example. The experimental signatures of quantum…
Quantum field theory predicts the vacuum to exhibit a non-linear response to strong electromagnetic fields. This fundamental tenet has remained experimentally challenging and is yet to be tested in the laboratory. We present proof of…
We demonstrate that tailored laser beams provide a powerful means to make quantum vacuum signatures in strong electromagnetic fields accessible in experiment. Typical scenarios aiming at the detection of quantum vacuum nonlinearities at the…
Vacuum birefringence (VB), a fundamental prediction of nonlinear quantum electrodynamics (QED), has eluded direct laboratory detection due to its extreme weakness. We propose a compact, "self-probing" scheme where a GeV electron beam…
The tremendous progress in high-intensity laser technology and the establishment of dedicated high-field laboratories in recent years have paved the way towards a first observation of quantum vacuum nonlinearities at the high-intensity…
The quantum vacuum shows an intensity-dependent nonlinear index of refraction. Consequently, we may consider vacuum as a non-linear medium enabling, at sufficiently high field strengths, a direct interaction of light with light. In this…
Quantum electrodynamics predicts x-ray diffractions under a high-intensity laser field via virtual charged particles, and this phenomenon is called as vacuum diffraction (VD). In this paper, we derive a new formula to describe VD in a…
We study the perspectives of measuring the phenomenon of vacuum birefringence predicted by quantum electrodynamics using an x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) alone. We devise an experimental scheme allowing the XFEL beam to collide with…
The nonlinear quantum interaction of a linearly polarized x-ray probe beam with a focused intense standing laser wave is studied theoretically. Because of the tight focusing of the standing laser pulse, diffraction effects arise for the…
Quantum vacuum fluctuations give rise to effective non-linear interactions between electromagnetic fields. A prominent signature of quantum vacuum nonlinearities driven by macroscopic fields are signal photons differing in characteristic…
The fundamental theory of quantum electrodynamics predicts the vacuum to resemble a polarizable medium. This gives rise to effective nonlinear interactions between electromagnetic fields and light-by-light scattering phenomena. We study the…
Up to date, quantum electrodynamics (QED) is the most precisely tested quantum field theory. Nevertheless, particularly in the high-intensity regime it predicts various phenomena that so far have not directly been accessible in all-optical…
Vacuum fluctuations give rise to effective nonlinear interactions between electromagnetic fields. These generically modify the characteristics of light traversing a strong-field region. X-ray free-electron lasers constitute a particularly…