The laser wakefield acceleration experiment at Ecole Polytechnique
Résumé
A laser wakefield electron acceleration experiment has been set-up at Ecole Polytechnique. An electron beam with 3 MeV total energy is injected in a plasma wave generated by laser wakefield using the new LULI CPA laser (400 fs [FWHM], I<1017 W/cm2). The first results show an effective acceleration of the order of 1 MeV, with a maximum when the electron density is close to the optimum value for which the laser pulse length is about half the plasma wavelength