Observation of tunable parametric x-ray radiation emitted by laser-plasma electron beams interacting with crystalline structures

Parametric x-ray radiation (PXR) is the quantum process analog to Laue diffraction where a pseudophoton is scattered out of a crystalline structure as a radiation photon. In this work, PXR emitted by electron beams generated in a compact laser-plasma accelerator and interacting afterward with a Si 2...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: A. Curcio, M. Ehret, J. A. Perez-Hernandez, G. Gatti
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: American Physical Society 2022-06-01
Series:Physical Review Accelerators and Beams
Online Access:http://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevAccelBeams.25.063403
Description
Summary:Parametric x-ray radiation (PXR) is the quantum process analog to Laue diffraction where a pseudophoton is scattered out of a crystalline structure as a radiation photon. In this work, PXR emitted by electron beams generated in a compact laser-plasma accelerator and interacting afterward with a Si 220 crystal is observed in single-shot operations. The combination of laser wakefield acceleration and PXR is an efficient and table-top way to obtain monochromatic, pulsed, ultrashort, and stable emission of high-energy photons: to our knowledge such a complete set of performance parameters is new. Unlike other relevant radiation mechanisms, such as betatron radiation or incoherent bremsstrahlung, PXR is insensitive to the beam energy spread. With a long crystal, we demonstrate the stability of the PXR bandwidth toward shot-to-shot variations of the beam energy and divergence.
ISSN:2469-9888