Plasma waveguide control of low divergence, high charge multi-GeV electron beams
ORAL
Abstract
The first demonstrations of fully optical multi-GeV laser wakefield acceleration (LWFA) have been enabled by the advent of low density (~1017 cm-3), meter-scale plasma waveguides generated in supersonic gas jets [1-7]. I will present recent experiments and a new propagation model [5,6] demonstrating how control of plasma waveguide properties leads to multi-GeV electron bunches with nC-level charge and sub-milliradian divergence. Specifically, I will discuss experimental data from a scan of the plasma waveguide matched mode waist radius and corresponding simulations to illustrate how beam propagation in each channel results in control over electron beam charge, energy, divergence, energy spread, and beam profile. Finally, I will share demonstrations of custom waveguide features including tailored plasma waveguides to improve coupling and counteract dephasing.
*Funding Acknowledgements: This work was supported by the U.S. DoE (DE-SC0015516, LaserNetUS DE-SC0019076/FWP#SCW1668, and DE-SC0011375), NSF (PHY2010511), DARPA’s Muons for Science and Security Program (MuS2). Simulations used DoD HPC support provided through AFOSR (FA9550-21-1-0405). E.R. is supported by NSF GRFP (DGE 1840340). Portions of work prepared by LLNL under Contract DE-AC52-07NA27344.
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Publication:[1] L. Feder et al., Phys. Rev. Res. 2, 043173(2020). [2] J.E. Shrock et al., Phys. Plasmas 29, 073101(2022). [3] B. Miao et al., Phys. Rev. X. 12, 031038(2022). [4] B. Miao et al., Physics Today 76, 54 (2023). [5] E. Rockafellow et al., in preparation (2024). [6] J.E. Shrock et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., in press (2024). [7] J.E. Shrock et al., in preparation (2024).
