Radiation from laser-plasma interactions - From diagnostics to all-optical free-electron lasers

Radiation spectra from Laser-Plasma interactions are straightforward to obtain in experiment, but due to the large number of simulated particles these are challenging to model ab-initio. Since the emitted spectra include the complete phase-space dynamics, they are a key to both designing and optimizing brilliant plasma-driven x-ray sources for applications such as ultra-short pump-probe experiments. We present angularly-resolved em-radiation spectra from all billions of particles in a laser-plasma simulation, including the full coherence properties from plasma structure and dynamics. These spectra range from far IR to X-rays. We show recent results from the multi-GPU, open-source code PIConGPU.

We use very similar methods, when designing optical free-electron lasers (OFELs) driven by Laser-wakefield accelerated (LWFA) electrons using both existing LWFA beams and OFEL driver lasers. Such optical FELs (OFELs) based on Traveling-wave Thomson scattering (TWTS) optimally exploit the high spectral photon density in high-power laser pulses by spatially stretching the laser pulse and overlapping it with the electrons in a side scattering setup. The introduction of a laser pulse-front tilt provides for interaction lengths appropriate for FEL operation. With careful dispersion control, electrons witness an undulator field of almost constant strength and wavelength over hundreds to thousands of undulator periods, thus giving enough time for self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE) to seed the FEL instability and the realization of large laser gains.