Novel Aspects of Direct Laser Acceleration of Relativistic Electrons

Abstract

We examine the impact of several factors on electron acceleration by a laser pulse and the resulting electron energy gain. Specifically, we consider the role played by: 1) static longitudinal electric field; 2) static transverse electric field; 3) electron injection into the laser pulse; and 4) static longitudinal magnetic field. It is shown that all of these factors lead, under certain conditions, to a considerable electron energy gain from the laser pulse. In contrast with other mechanisms such as wakefield acceleration, the static electric fields in this case do not directly transfer substantial energy to the electron. Instead, they reduce the longitudinal dephasing between the electron and the laser beam, which then allows the electron to gain extra energy from the beam. The mechanisms discussed here are relevant to experiments with under-dense gas jets, as well as to experiments with solid-density targets involving an extended pre-plasma.

References in corpus (4)

• Generation of 'Super-Ponderomotive' Electrons due to a non-Wakefield interaction between a Laser Pulse and a Longitudinal Electric Field
• Enhancement of laser-driven electron acceleration in an ion channel
• On The Origin of Super-Hot Electrons from Intense Laser Interactions with Solid Targets having Moderate Scale Length Preformed Plasmas
• Temporal resolution criterion for correctly simulating relativistic electron motion in a high-intensity laser field

Cited by in corpus (25)

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• Vacuum laser acceleration of super-ponderomotive electrons using relativistic transparency injection
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• Accurate simulation of direct laser acceleration in a laser wakefield accelerator
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• Progress in relativistic laser-plasma interaction with kilotesla-level applied magnetic fields
• Stochastic electron heating in the laser and quasi-static electric and magnetic fields
• Electron dynamics in laser and quasi-static transverse electric and longitudinal magnetic fields
• Generation of focusing ion beams by magnetized electron sheath acceleration
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• Emission of electromagnetic waves as a stopping mechanism for nonlinear collisionless ionization waves in a high-$\beta$ regime