Experimental investigations of synchrotron radiation at the onset of the quantum regime

The classical description of synchrotron radiation fails at large Lorentz factors, $gamma$, for relativistic electrons crossing strong transverse magnetic fields $B$. In the rest frame of the electron this field is comparable to the so-called critical field $B_0 = 4.414cdot10^9$ T. For $chi = gamma B/B_0 simeq 1$ quantum corrections are essential for the description of synchrotron radiation to conserve energy. With electrons of energies 10-150 GeV penetrating a germanium single crystal along the $<110>$ axis, we have experimentally investigated the transition from the regime where classical synchrotron radiation is an adequate description, to the regime where the emission drastically changes character; not only in magnitude, but also in spectral shape. The spectrum can only be described by quantum synchrotron radiation formulas. Apart from being a test of strong-field quantum electrodynamics, the experimental results are also relevant for the design of future linear colliders where beamstrahlung - a closely related process - may limit the achievable luminosity.