Gamma-ray generation in ultrahigh-intensity laser-foil interactions

• DOI: 10.1063/1.4863423
• Publication Date: 2014-01-31T18:09:33Z
• Authors: E. N. Nerush; I. Yu. Kostyukov; L. Ji; A. Pukhov
• Keywords: Plasma Physics (physics.plasm-ph); 0103 physical sciences; FOS: Physical sciences; 01 natural sciences; 7. Clean energy; Physics - Plasma Physics

Copyright 2014 American Institute of Physics. This article may be downloaded for personal use only. Any other use requires prior permission of the author and the American Institute of Physics. The following article appeared in Physics of Plasmas and may be found at http://scitation.aip.org/content/aip/journal/pop/21/1/10.1063/1.4863423<br/>Incoherent photon emission by ultrarelativistic electrons in the normal incidence of a laser pulse on a foil is investigated by means of three-dimensional numerical simulations in the range of intensities $2 \times 10^{21} \text{--} 2 \times 10^{25} \text{W} \, \text{cm}^{-2}$ and electron densities $2 \times 10^{22} \text{--} 1 \times 10^{24} \text{cm}^{-3}$. We focus on properties of the resulting synchrotron radiation, such as its overall energy, directivity of the radiation pattern and slope of the energy spectrum. Regimes of laser-foil interactions are studied in the framework of a simple analytical model. The laser-plasma parameters for efficient gamma-ray generation are found and revealed to be close to the parameters for relativistic foil motion. It is shown that in the case of oblique incidence of a $3 \text{PW}$, $10 \text{fs}$ laser pulse on a thin foil about $10^{8} \text{photons}/0.1\% \text{bandwidth}$ are produced at the energy level of $1 \text{MeV}$ that significantly exceeds performance of the modern Compton gamma-ray sources. Various applications of the gamma-ray bunches are discussed.<br/>