2010/02/18 by D. an der Brügge, A. Pukhov · 5 citations
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Physics and Astronomy · #Advanced Electron Microscopy Techniques and Applications #Electron #Harmonics #Laser-Matter Interactions and Applications #Laser-Plasma Interactions and Diagnostics #Nuclear physics #Physics #Plasma #Quantum electrodynamics #Quantum mechanics #Relativistic plasma #physics.plasm-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1063/1.3353050
to appear in Physics of Plasmas
arxiv created 2010/02/18 · openalex publication_date 2010/03/01 · arxiv updated 2011/08/10 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
It is shown that when a few-cycle, relativistically intense, p-polarized laser pulse is obliquely incident on overdense plasma, the surface electrons may form ultrathin, highly compressed layers with a width of a few nanometers. These electron “nanobunches” emit synchrotron radiation coherently. We calculate the one-dimensional synchrotron spectrum analytically and obtain a slowly decaying power law with an exponent of 4/3 or 6/5. This is much flatter than the 8/3 power of the Baeva–Gordienko–Pukhov spectrum, produced by a relativistically oscillating bulk skin layer. The synchrotron spectrum cutoff frequency is defined either by the electron relativistic γ-factor or by the thickness of the emitting layer. In the numerically demonstrated, locally optimal case, the radiation is emitted in the form of a single attosecond pulse, which contains almost the entire energy of the full optical cycle.