Relativistically strong electromagnetic radiation in a plasma
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bution for the JETP special issue in honor of L.V. Keldysh’s 85th birthday
Relativistically Strong Electromagnetic Radiation in a Plasma S. V. Bulanova, b, T. Zh. Esirkepova, M. Kandoa, H. Kiriyamaa, and K. Kondoa b
a Kansai Photon Science Institute, Japan Atomic Energy Agency, Kizugawa, 6190215 Japan Prokhorov General Physics Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, ul. Vavilova 38, Moscow, 119991 Russia e-mail: [email protected], [email protected]
Received December 14, 2015
Abstract—Physical processes in a plasma under the action of relativistically strong electromagnetic waves generated by high-power lasers have been briefly reviewed. These processes are of interest in view of the development of new methods for acceleration of charged particles, creation of sources of bright hard electromagnetic radiation, and investigation of macroscopic quantum-electrodynamical processes. Attention is focused on nonlinear waves in a laser plasma for the creation of compact electron accelerators. The acceleration of plasma bunches by the radiation pressure of light is the most efficient regime of ion acceleration. Coherent hard electromagnetic radiation in the relativistic plasma is generated in the form of higher harmonics and/or electromagnetic pulses, which are compressed and intensified after reflection from relativistic mirrors created by nonlinear waves. In the limit of extremely strong electromagnetic waves, radiation friction, which accompanies the conversion of radiation from the optical range to the gamma range, fundamentally changes the behavior of the plasma. This process is accompanied by the production of electron–positron pairs, which is described within quantum electrodynamics theory. DOI: 10.1134/S1063776116030146
1. INTRODUCTION For five decades since the creation of first lasers, achievements in this scientific field and development of technologies allow exceeding the petawatt (1015 W) power level of laser pulses [1]. More than 50 petawatt lasers are now in operation or under development. They can be classified into two groups. The first group includes high-energy lasers providing relatively long pulses for controlled nuclear fusion [2]. The second group includes lasers that generate ultrashort femtosecond pulses with a relatively low energy, thus ensuring the record high power of the generated radiation [3]. The main fields of investigations with the use of such lasers are the creation of compact accelerations of charged particles [4, 5] and sources of bright hard electromagnetic radiation [6– 8], controlled nuclear fusion within the concept of fast ignition [9, 10], and study of the properties of matter in the field of extremely intense radiation [11]. Planned experiments with the use of superhigh-power lasers imply the simulation of astrophysical processes [12]. This field was called laboratory astrophysics although the simulation of astrophysical processes does not necessarily involve lasers (see, e.g., [13]). The extreme light infrastructure project [14] including the ELI-BL center in the Cze
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