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Coherence-based Transverse Measurement of Synchrotron X-ray Radiation from Relativistic Laser-Plasma Interaction and of Laser-Accelerated Electrons
Rahul C. Shah, F. Albert, K. Ta Phuoc, F. Burgy, J.-P. Rousseau, O. Shevchenko, D. Boschetto, and A. Rousse
Laboratoire dOptique Applique, ENSTA, CNRS UMR7639, Ecole Polytechnique, Chemin de la Hunire, 91761 Palaiseau, France; email: rahul.shah@ensta.fr.

Alexander Pukhov and Sergei Kiselev

Institut fur Theoretische Physik I, Heinrich-Heine-Universitat, 40225 Dusseldorf, Germany

Abstract: Fresnel diffraction of x-ray beam from laser-plasma interaction shows incoherent-source diameter8 m. Analysis shows this corresponds to accelerated electron prole in plasma agreeing with simulation.
c 2005 Optical Society of America
OCIS codes: (320.2250) femtosecond phenomena; (340.6720) synchrotron radiation; (340.7480) x-rays

1.

Introduction

Laser-based x-ray source development recently reached a new milestone: a narrow divergence (50 mrad), broadspectrum keV energy x-ray beam generated from the interaction of a femtosecond intense laser pulse (I 1018 W/cm2 ) with a gas target [1]. At these intensities, the laser plows electrons from its path and generates a longitudinal plasma oscillation which can accelerate both thermal and quasi-monochromatic electron beams to several hundred MeV energies [2]. The order 109 x-ray photons originate from the transverse oscillations, or betatron motions, of laser-accelerated electrons within the plasma-accelerating structure. Because the electrons radiate x-rays incoherently in the betatron mechanism, the x-ray source size determines the correlation, or degree of spatial coherence, between transversely differing points of the emitted radiation. Accurate source size measurement characterizes the betatron radiation for coherence based techniques such as phase contrast imaging and holography. The measurement also contains information about the transverse energetic electron distribution within the laser-plasma accelerator, expected from simulations to be of order few microns. We present measurement of the Fresnel single edge diffraction from the laser synchrotron source at keV energies and analysis discussing the transverse dimensions of the radiation and energetic electrons [3]. 2. Measurements

The experiments were performed using a 10 Hz, titanium-doped sapphire (Ti:sapphire) laser with central wavelength 820 nm congured in chirped pulse amplication. The laser delivered energies up to 1 J on target in 30 fs with linear horizontal polarization. An f /18 off-axis parabolic mirror focused the pulse into the helium output (11019 electrons/cm3 ) of a 3 mm supersonic jet. The laser produced vacuum-focused intensity 31018 W/cm2 . The energetic electrons were deected by a 1 T, 10 cm permanent magnet to provide an electron spectrum for energies between 40-200 MeV simultaneous with the x-ray detection. The diffraction edge vertically bisected the xray beam 13 cm from the laser focus, and a back-illuminated, cooled charge-coupled device (CCD) of 20 m pixels (Roper Scientic) detected the x-ray signal on axis 195 cm from the blade. A 25 m Be lter, permitting photons > 1 keV, ltered the entire CCD. Two additional lters (2 m and 25 m Cu) selected photons primarily above 4 keV and 7 keV within each shot. In the betatron mechanism, the radiating electrons oscillate around one unique central axis due to the Coulomb restoring force of the ions, and the electrons radiate signicantly only at the peaks of their transverse oscillations [4]. For the conditions of the betatron radiation explored here the radiation from individual betatron oscillation peaks of a single electron can be summed incoherently, and the radiation can be taken to have a spherical wavefront. Based on these conclusions, the point diffraction pattern at each frequency has been treated by the standard Fresnel integral so-

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Fig. 1. Experimental and theoretical diffraction for Gaussian source intensity proles. INSET: Spectral density of diffraction signal determined from lters.

lution for single-edge diffraction by a spherical wave emitters with the inclusion of phase and amplitude transmission of the harder x-rays. The total diffraction pattern results from incoherent addition over the emission prole and spectrum. The signal measured within the three lter bins allowed estimation of the source power spectrum, and the calculated Fresnel diffraction showed negligible change within the error of this estimation. The combination of the exponentially decaying source spectrum, the x-ray lter, and the detector response produced a several keV power spectrum with center energy 4.5 keV (Figure 1(inset)). Appropriate transverse radiation intensity prole stems from characteristics of the betatron radiation mechanism coupled with the electron distribution. The properties of the synchrotron radiation show that when the energy of the electrons is sufcient to generate radiation power spectrum centered at or above the observation frequency, the transverse source intensity prole nearly resembles that of the electrons. For electrons of insufcient energy, the radiation prole widens with respect to that of the electrons. In this sense, the determined radiation source prole represents an upper limit of an average electron beam spread within the accelerating plasma. Figure 1 presents the result of averaging of ve signals along with theoretical curves calculated for Gaussian cross-sectional intensity proles and accounting for the measured power spectrum, edge transmission and roughness. The theoretical curve sets a maximum of Gaussian FWHM=8 m on the experimental measurement, and only small variation arises (maximum 1 m) from use of uniform source prole. For this order of oscillation amplitudes of the electrons, an order 100 MeV electron energy produces power spectrum center near 4 keV, in accord with the measured range of electron energies. Three-dimensional (3D), particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation [5] for the given experimental conditions shows the self-injection of electrons into the accelerating bubble-like structure results in a full range of transverse oscillation amplitudes of the radiating electrons. In the simulation, the linear density of electrons >100 MeV along the perpendicular of the measured diffraction and at the plasma exit shows near-Gaussian distribution of 4 m FWHM. This simulation result agrees with the analysis indicating the x-ray measurement presents an upper limit on the transverse dimension of the electrons. By analysis of single-edge Fresnel diffraction, the x-ray source size of this fully laser-based synchrotron radiation has been estimated, for Gaussian prole, as having FWHM< 8 m at center energy 4 keV. The analysis shows this measurement corresponds to the transverse dimension of relativistic electrons within the plasma in the near-resonant, highly-non-linear regime of laser-wakeeld acceleration, and the measurement agrees with the results of PIC simulation (FWHM=4 m). Such measurements are fundamental to both the x-ray radiation coherence and emittance of the femtosecond electron beam, the latter of which calculations show can be dominated by the betatron oscillations as opposed to the space charge forces. Supported by EU under Contract Nos. HPRI-CT-1999-00086, HPRI-CT-2000-40016, and HPRI-CT-1999-50004 (FAMTO project). R.S. acknowledges both NSF (IRFP Grant 0502281) and CNRS. References
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. K. TaPhuoc et al., Phys. Plasmas 12, 023101 (2005); A. Rousse et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 93, 135005 (2004). J. Faure et al., Nature 431, 541 (2004); C.G.R. Geddes et al., Nature 431, 538 (2004); S.P.D. Mangles et al., Nature 431, 535 (2004). R. C. Shah et al., Phys. Rev. E 74, 045401(R) (2006). E. Esarey et al., Phys. Rev. E 65, 056505 (2002); J. D. Jackson, Classical Electrodynamics, (Wiley, New York, 1976). Virtual Laser-Plasma Laboratory PIC code. See for example A. Pukhov, J. Meyer ter Vehn, Appl. Phys. B 74, 355 (2002).

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