Related papers: GeV-scale accelerators driven by plasma-modulated …
The extreme electric fields created in high-intensity laser-plasma interactions could generate energetic ions far more compactly than traditional accelerators. Despite this promise, laser-plasma accelerators have remained stagnant at…
Self-guided femtosecond laser pulses propagating in low-pressure gas can generate plasma filaments, establishing a new framework for plasma wakefield acceleration. Unlike conventional schemes relying on mechanically confined or preformed…
Laser-plasma acceleration produces ultrashort, high-brightness ion beams reaching tens of MeV, yet their large divergence and broad energy spread require dedicated capture elements for beam transport. Using laser-accelerated protons from…
We report on the first results of laser plasma wakefield acceleration driven by ultrashort mid-infrared laser pulses (\lambda= 3.9 \mu m, 100 fs, 0.25 TW), which enable near- and above-critical density interactions with moderate-density gas…
The cost, size and availability of electron accelerators is dominated by the achievable accelerating gradient. Conventional high-brightness radio-frequency (RF) accelerating structures operate with 30-50 MeV/m gradients. Electron…
The extreme electromagnetic fields sustained by plasma-based accelerators allow for energy gain rates above 100 GeV/m but are also an inherent source of correlated energy spread. This severely limits the usability of these devices. Here we…
We propose a hybrid laser-driven ion acceleration scheme using a combination target of a solid foil and a density-tailored background plasma. In the first stage, a sub-relativistic proton beam can be generated by the radiation pressure…
Next-generation plasma-based accelerators can push electron bunches to gigaelectronvolt energies within centimetre distances. The plasma, excited by a driver pulse, generates large electric fields that can efficiently accelerate a trailing…
The radiation pressure of next generation ultra-high intensity ($>10^{23}$ W/cm$^{2}$) lasers could efficiently accelerate ions to GeV energies. However, nonlinear quantum-electrodynamic effects play an important role in the interaction of…
Laser wakefield acceleration relies on the excitation of a plasma wave due to the ponderomotive force of an intense laser pulse. However, plasma wave trains in the wake of the laser have scarcely been studied directly in experiments. Here…
The excitation of THz radiation by the interaction of an ultra short laser pulse with the modes of a miniature corrugated plasma waveguide is considered. The axially corrugated waveguide supports the electromagnetic (EM) modes with…
The interaction of micro- and nano-structured target surfaces with high-power laser pulses is being widely investigated for its unprecedented absorption efficiency. We have developed vertically aligned metallic micro-pillar arrays for…
The attainable transformer ratio in plasma accelerators is limited by instabilities. Using three-dimensional particle-in-cell simulations, we demonstrate that these can be controlled using a hollow plasma channel with a co-axial plasma…
The interaction of ultraintense laser pulses with solids is largely affected by the plasma gradient at the vacuum-solid interface, which modifies the absorption and ultimately, controls the energy distribution function of heated electrons.…
Plasma-based accelerators are compact and provide high gradients, yet their practical use has been limited by energy gain, stability, beam quality, and energy transfer efficiency. Here, we address several of these challenges simultaneously…
Using plasma mirror injection we demonstrate, both analytically and numerically, that a circularly polarized helical laser pulse can accelerate highly collimated dense bunches of electrons to several hundred MeV using currently available…
Experimental results, supported by precise modelling, demonstrate optimisation of a plasma-based injector with intermediate laser pulse energy ($<1$ J), corresponding to a normalised vector potential $a_0 = 2.15$, using ionisation injection…
Compact laser-driven accelerators are versatile and powerful tools of unarguable relevance on societal grounds for the diverse purposes of science, health, security, and technology because they bring enormous practicality to…
The GeV light curve of a pulsar is an important probe to detect acceleration regions in its magnetosphere. Motivated by the recent reports on the observations of pulsars by {\it Fermi} Large Area Telescope (LAT), we restudy the two-pole…
Fundamental to many applications of laser pulses in science and technology is an extended interaction length with matter that significantly exceeds the distance over which the pulse would normally diffract and transversely spread. At low…