Acceleration of electrons by high intensity laser radiation in a magnetic field

TL;DR

This paper investigates how ultra-intense, ultra-short laser pulses combined with a magnetic field can accelerate electrons in vacuum up to GeV energies, producing high-quality electron beams with minimal energy spread.

Contribution

It demonstrates a method for electron acceleration using high-intensity laser radiation in a magnetic field, achieving energies up to 2.1 GeV and analyzing conditions for optimal acceleration.

Findings

Electron energies can reach up to 2.1 GeV.

Electron energy growth scales with laser intensity and initial energy.

Electron beams with energy spread less than 1% can be produced.

Abstract

We consider the acceleration of electrons in vacuum by means of the circularly-polirized electromagnetic wave, propagating along a magnetic field. We show that the electron energy growth, when using ultra-short and ultra-intense laser pulses (10 ps, 10^{18} Bm/cm^2, CO_{2} laser) in the presence of a magnetic field, may reach up to the value 2,1 Gev. The growth of the electron energy is shown to increase proportionally with the increase of the laser intensity and the initial energy of the electron. We find that for some direction of polarization of the wave, the acceleration of electrons does not depend on the initial phase of the electromagnetic wave. We estimate the laser intensity, necessary for the electron acceleration. In addition, we find the formation length of photon absorption by electrons, due to which one may choose the required region of the interaction of the electrons with the electromagnetic wave and magnetic field. We also show that as a result of acceleration of electrons in the vacuum by laser radiation in a magnetic field one may obtain electron beam with small energy spread of the order. We also show that as a result of acceleration of electrons in the vacuum by laser radiation in a magnetic field one may obtain electron beam with small energy spread of the order {\delta\epsilon}/{\epsilon} < 10^{-2}.