Ion Acceleration by Short Chirped Laser Pulses

Direct laser acceleration of ions by short frequency-chirped laser pulses is investigated theoretically. We demonstrate that intense beams of ions with a kinetic energy broadening of about 1 % can be generated. The chirping of the laser pulse allows the particles to gain kinetic energies of hundreds of MeVs, which is required for hadron cancer therapy, from pulses of energies of the order of 100 J. It is shown that few-cycle chirped pulses can accelerate ions more efficiently than long ones, i.e. higher ion kinetic energies are reached with the same amount of total electromagnetic pulse energy

Attosecond gamma-ray pulses via nonlinear Compton scattering in the radiation dominated regime

The feasibility of generation of bright ultrashort gamma-ray pulses is demonstrated in the interaction of a relativistic electron bunch with a counterpropagating tightly-focused superstrong laser beam in the radiation dominated regime. The Compton scattering spectra of gamma-radiation are investigated using a semiclassical description for the electron dynamics in the laser field and a quantum electrodynamical description for the photon emission. We demonstrate the feasibility of ultrashort gamma-ray bursts of hundreds of attoseconds and of dozens of megaelectronvolt photon energies in the near-backwards direction of the initial electron motion. The tightly focused laser field structure and radiation reaction are shown to be responsible for such short gamma-ray bursts which are independent of the durations of the electron bunch and of the laser pulse. The results are measurable with the laser technology available in a near-future

Feasibility of electron cyclotron autoresonance acceleration by a short terahertz pulse

A vacuum autoresonance accelerator scheme for electrons, which employs terahertz radiation and currently available magnetic fields, is suggested. Based on numerical simulations, parameter values, which could make the scheme experimentally feasible, are identified and discussed

High-quality multi-GeV electron bunches via cyclotron autoresonance

Autoresonance laser acceleration of electrons is theoretically investigated using circularly polarized focused Gaussian pulses. Many-particle simulations demonstrate feasibility of creating over 10-GeV electron bunches of ultra-high quality (relative energy spread of order 10^-4), suitable for fundamental high-energy particle physics research. The laser peak intensities and axial magnetic field strengths required are up to about 10^18 W/cm^2 (peak power ~10 PW) and 60 T, respectively. Gains exceeding 100 GeV are shown to be possible when weakly focused pulses from a 200-PW laser facility are used

Thermodynamics of AdS/QCD within the 5D dilaton-gravity model

We calculate the pressure, entropy density, trace anomaly and speed of sound of the gluon plasma using the dilaton potential of Ref. arXiv:0911.0627[hep-ph] in the dilaton-gravity theory of AdS/QCD. The finite temperature observables are calculated from the Black Hole solutions of the Einstein equations, and using the Bekenstein-Hawking equality of the entropy with the area of the horizon. Renormalization is well defined, because the T=0 theory has asymptotic freedom. Comparison with lattice simulations is made.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures. To appear in the proceedings of 15th International Conference in Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD 10), Montpellier, France, 28 Jun - 3 Jul 201

Phenomenology of AdS/QCD and Its Gravity Dual

We construct the dilaton potential in the gravity dual theory of AdS/QCD for the warp factor of Refs.{1,2}. Using this AdS_5-metric with properties similar to QCD, we find that the gravity dual leads to a meaningful gauge coupling in the region between the charmonium and bottonium mass, but differs slightly from QCD in the extreme UV. When we fix the ultraviolet behavior in accord with the beta-function, we can obtain good agreement with the overall heavy quark-antiquark potential. Although the leading order proportional to -\alpha^{4/3}/r differs from perturbative QCD, the full potential agrees quite well with the short distance QCD potential in NNLO.Comment: 42 pages, 13 figures, 1 tabl

Wilson Loop-Loop Correlators in AdS/QCD

We calculate the expectation value of one circular Wilson loop and the correlator of two concentric circular Wilson loops in AdS/QCD using the modified AdS_5-metric given in Ref.[1]. The confinement properties of this metric in AdS/QCD are analyzed and compared with QCD and Nambu-Goto theory in four dimensions.Comment: 22 pages, 14 figure

Intense high-quality medical proton beams via laser fields

During the past decade, the interaction of high-intensity lasers with solid targets has attracted much interest, regarding its potential in accelerating charged particles. In spite of tremendous progress in laser-plasma based acceleration, it is still not clear which particle beam quality will be accessible within the upcoming multi petawatt (1 PW = 10$^{15}$ W) laser generation. Here, we show with simulations based on the coupled relativistic equations of motion that protons stemming from laser-plasma processes can be efficiently post-accelerated using crossed laser beams focused to spot radii of a few laser wavelengths. We demonstrate that the crossed beams produce monoenergetic accelerated protons with kinetic energies $> 200$ MeV, small energy spreads ($\approx$ 1$$) and high densities as required for hadron cancer therapy. To our knowledge, this is the first scheme allowing for this important application based on an all-optical set-up.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figures, 1 tabl

Laser-generated Ion Beams for Medical Applications

The advent of high-power laser systems paved the way for laser acceleration of ion beams. Based on theoretical simulations, we demonstrate the feasibility of laser-generated ion beams matching the strict requirements for radio-oncological applications. Particle energies of several hundred MeV and low energy spreads of 1% are feasible within the framework of direct laser acceleration. A mechanism is suggested to efficiently post-accelerate particle beams originating from laser-plasma interaction processes, where the injection of ions into the focus is modeled in a realistic way. Introducing a long-wavelength CO2 laser leads to an increase in the total number of particles accelerated as one bunch by three orders of magnitude as compared to lasers with a wavelength around 1 μm. By employing pulsed laser systems in a single- and a crossed-beams configuration, we show that ion beams of high particle numbers can be produced. In a different setting we put forward the interaction of a chirped laser pulse with a hydrogen gas target of spatial extension of the order of the laser wavelength studied by means of particle-in-cell simulations. The low frequency components of the laser pulse allow for generating clinically applicable beams already while interacting with state-of-the-art laser systems of intensities of 1021 W/cm2