Ponderomotive Injection in Plasma Wakefield Accelerators

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel electron injection method in plasma wakefield accelerators using ponderomotive forces, enabling high-quality electron beams with low emittance and energy spread, demonstrated through theoretical analysis and simulations.

Contribution

It proposes a new injection scheme utilizing ponderomotive acceleration in sub-relativistic plasma wakefields, enhancing beam quality and trapping efficiency.

Findings

High-quality electron beams with sub-micrometer emittance

Sub-percent uncorrelated energy spreads achieved

Effective trapping below traditional potential thresholds

Abstract

A new electron injection scheme is proposed in sub-relativistic plasma wakefield accelerators. A transverse laser ionizes a dopant gas and ponderomotively accelerates the released electrons in the direction of wake propagation. This process enables electron trapping in the wakefield even for a wakefield potential below the trapping threshold. We study the scheme theoretically and by means of particle-in-cell simulations to demonstrate high-quality beam formation and acceleration with sub-micrometer normalized emittances and sub-percent uncorrelated energy spreads.