Bright X-ray radiation from plasma bubbles in an evolving laser wakefield accelerator

Abstract

We show that the properties of the electron beam and bright x-rays produced by a laser wakefield accelerator can be predicted if the distance over which the laser self-focuses and compresses prior to self-injection is taken into account. A model based on oscillations of the beam inside a plasma bubble shows that performance is optimised when the plasma length is matched to the laser depletion length. With a 200~TW laser pulse this results in an x-ray beam with median photon energy of \unit[20]{keV}, $>6\times 10^8$ photons above \unit[1]{keV} per shot and a peak brightness of $\unit[3 \times 10^{22}]{photons~s^{-1}mrad^{-2}mm^{-2} (0.1\% BW)^{-1}}$.

arXiv comment5 pages, 4 figures

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Cited by in corpus (2)

• Stable and high quality electron beams from staged laser and plasma wakefield accelerators
• Bright synchrotron radiation from relativistic self-trapping of a short laser pulse in near-critical density plasma