Graduate Student Training through Research on Plasma-Based Accelerators

University Of Texas At Austin, Austin TX

Investigators

Abstract

The NSF Collaborative grant "Graduate Student Training through Research on Plasma-Based Accelerators", has supported the work of 14 graduate students since September 1, 2009 at seven different institutions. Eight of these students have already graduated and another six are expected to graduate by September 2014. This project supports one of these six students, whose scientific goal is to visualize --- in a single shot --- evolving plasma structures that propagate at the speed of light in the wake of intense ultrashort laser pulses or electron bunches. The single-shot Frequency Domain Holography (FDH) visualization and control techniques developed and refined through this research can impact a wide cross section of plasma and accelerator science through the impact on Laser Plasma Accelerators (LPA). In LPA science, FDT will contribute fundamentally to scaling LPAs to multi-GeV energy. Compact FDT systems could ultimately become standard in-line metrology for future laser- and proton-driven plasma accelerators that produce electrons up to the energy frontier. These methods will also promote more reliable plasma-based accelerators, which are useful as compact, coherent x-ray sources for biological, chemical, and medical research, injectors for conventional accelerators, and medical accelerators. The student will apply and adapt the Frequency Domain Holography (FDH) cutting-edge visualization method developed in the PI's laboratory to new frontier plasma science problems: (1) He will implement FDT visualization of evolving laser-driven plasma bubbles in two regimes: (a) atmospheric density plasma driven by an ultrashort terawatt laser pulse; (b) 0.01 atmosphere plasma driven by the Texas Petawatt Laser, with the aim of understanding, optimizing and scaling a laser-plasma accelerator (LPA) that recently accelerated electrons to a world-record-breaking energy of 2 GeV. Particle-in-cell and photon-in-cell simulations will guide the experiments. (2) He will develop methods suitable for visualizing wakes in meter-long tenuous plasma. These methods will be designed with the intention of implementing them ultimately at advanced accelerator facilities such as SLAC's Facility for Accelerator Science and Experimental Tests (FACET).