The dynamics of electron injection from a shock front under a laser condition of a0 > 3 and tight focusing (FWHM < 10 µm) laser condition has been studied by numerical simulations. Compared to a regular longitudinal shockfront injection, the transverse injection starts near the edge of the bubble with a narrow energy spread of < 13 MeV. The trajectories of the transverse injected electrons are more coherent than the longitudinal injection. By applying the tilted shock front, the betatron oscillation amplitude is significantly larger than the un-tilted shock front. The enhancement of the betatron radiation brightness has been observed.
We propose a table-top linearly polarized hard X-ray source by using a tilted shock-front injection in a laser wakefield accelerator (LWFA) to achieve comprehensive control of both polarization and energy of X-ray. By using shock-front injection, the electron bunches are injected during a sharp transition of plasma density. The length of density transition is significantly shorter than the plasma wavelength and offers a highly localized injection. In regular injection methods, such as self and ionization injection, the majority of electrons are injected radially symmetrically. Particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations show the tilted shock front breaks radial symmetry of injection and creates coherent in-plane oscillation of electrons. The coherence of electron bunches is maximized around 30 degrees which leads to a linearly polarized betatron radiation. The polarization of the resulting X-ray is analyzed by Bragg diffraction after collimation by a polycapillary lens.
For quasi-phase matching of high-harmonic generation at short wavelengths, a beat-wave pulse train with 66-fs pulse separation is generated from a two-color Ti:sapphire amplifier system. By using such pulse train to collide with the main driving pulse for harmonic generation in the interacting media, quasi-phase matching can be achieved. The 66-fs pulse separation matches to a quasi-phase-matching zone length of 4.9 μm, which corresponds to a dephasing length for 3-nm harmonic generation under 1.0×1018 cm−3 plasma density. The pulse train energy is 100 mJ, sufficient to support more than 1000 quasi-phase-matching zones.
By adding a transverse heater pulse with controlled intensity distribution into the axicon ignitor-heater scheme for optically producing a plasma waveguide, three-dimensionally structured plasma waveguide can be fabricated. The additional heater pulse generates further heating of the plasma filament produced by the axicon pulses in a spatially and temporally controlled manner. The succeeding evolution of the plasma leads to a properly structured plasma waveguide that suits for targeted application. With this technique, induction of electron injection in a plasma-waveguide-based laser wakefield accelerator was achieved and resulted in production of a quasi-monoenergetic electron beam with an electron energy reaching 280 MeV and an energy spread as low as 1% in a 4-mm-long gas jet by properly setting the transverse heater pulse delay with respect to the axicon pulses. Furthermore, strong hard X-ray beam was observed upon further increase of transverse heater delay so that the irradiated section in the plasma waveguide acts as a plasma kicker to enhance betatron oscillation.
Efficient soft x-ray lasing was achieved by using plasma waveguide to confine the pump beam. With a 9-mm-long pure
krypton plasma waveguide prepared by using the axicon-ignitor-heater scheme, lasing at 32.8 nm is enhanced by 400
folds. An output level of 8×1010 photon/shot is reached at an energy conversion efficiency of 2×10-6. Seeding the laser
with high-harmonic generation yields small divergence, high coherence, and controlled polarization. Application in digital
holographic microscopy was demonstrated.
We experimentally demonstrate the amplification of optical-field-ionization soft x-ray lasers in an optically preformed plasma waveguide for pure xenon, krypton, and argon gases, respectively. The lasing photon number of Ni-like Kr laser at 32.8 nm generated in waveguide is dramatically enhanced by about three orders of magnitude in comparison to that without plasma waveguide, resulting in a photon number of 8×1010 and an energy conversion efficiency of 2×10-6 with a pump pulse of just 235 mJ. In addition to the 46.9 nm main lasing line for Ne-like argon, the 45.1 and 46.5 nm lasing lines are also observed, indicative of the strong enhancement effect and the large gas density in the plasma waveguide.
With this technique multispecies parallel x-ray lasing is also demonstrated in a Kr-Ar mixed-gas waveguide. By seeding
optical-field-ionization plasma with high harmonic signals, 32.8-nm Kr laser output can be further improved to produce brighter and better collimated x-ray laser beams. Comparing with the same laser seeded only with spontaneous emission, seeding with high harmonics yields much smaller divergence, enhanced spatial coherence, and controlled polarization. With the illumination of high-brightness 32.8-nm x-ray laser pulses, single-shot x-ray digital holographic
microscopy with an adjustable field of view and magnification is demonstrated successfully. The ultrashort x-ray pulse duration combined with single-shot capability offers great advantage for flash imaging of delicate samples.
An optical-field-ionization soft x-ray laser with prepulse-controlled nanoplasma expansion in a cluster gas jet was demonstrated. Pd-like xenon lasing at 41.8-nm with 95 nJ pulse energy and 5-mrad divergence was achieved, indicating near-saturation amplification. In addition, by using deflectometry of a longitudinal probe pulse to resolve the spatiotemporal distribution of the preformed plasma, we characterize and control the plasma density distribution near the target surface for the development of solid-target x-ray lasers. We show that the use of prepulses in an ignitor-heater scheme can increase the scale length of the preformed plasma and how the effect varies with target
materials.
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