Light-Matter Interaction Near the Schwinger Limit Using Tightly Focused Doppler-Boosted Lasers

2023/03/30 by N. Zaïm, Zaïm, Neïl, Antonin Sainte-Marie +10 · 3 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena #FOS: Physical sciences #Laser-Plasma Interactions and Diagnostics #Plasma Physics (physics.plasm-ph) #Quantum Electrodynamics and Casimir Effect

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2303.17581

openalex publication_date 2023/03/30 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

The Schwinger limit could be approached by focusing to its diffraction limit the light reflected by a plasma mirror irradiated by a multi-petawatt laser. We explore numerically the interaction between such intense light and matter. We find that the interaction with a relativistic counterpropagative electron beam would enable the exploration of the fully nonperturbative regime of strong-field quantum electrodynamics (SF-QED), while the interaction with an initially solid target leads to a profusion of SF-QED effects that retroact on the laser-plasma interaction. We observe in both scenarios the formation of relativistic attosecond electron-positron jets with very high densities.

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