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Single-cycle optical pulses with a controlled electromagnetic waveform allow to steer the motion of low-energy electrons in atoms, molecules, nanostructures or condensed-matter on attosecond dimensions in time. However, high-energy electrons under single-cycle light control would be an enabling technology for beam-based attosecond physics with free-electron lasers or electron microscopy. Here we report the control of freely propagating keV electrons with an isolated optical cycle of mid-infrared light and create a modulated electron current with a peak-cycle-specific sub-femtosecond structure in time. The evident effects of the carrier-envelope phase, amplitude and dispersion of the optical waveform on the temporal composition, pulse durations and chirp of the free-space electron wavefunction demonstrate the sub-cycle nature of our control. These results create novel opportunities in laser-driven particle acceleration, seeded free-electron lasers, attosecond space-time imaging, electron quantum optics and wherever else high-energy electrons are needed with the temporal structure of single-cycle light.
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Free-electron beams serve as uniquely versatile probes of microscopic structure and composition, and have repeatedly revolutionized atomic-scale imaging, from solid-state physics to structural biology. Over the past decade, the manipulation and interaction of electrons with optical fields has seen significant progress, enabling novel imaging methods, schemes of near-field electron acceleration, and culminating in 4D microscopy techniques with both high temporal and spatial resolution. However, weak coupling strengths of electron beams to optical excitations are a standing issue for existing and emerging applications of optical free-electron control. Here, we demonstrate phase matched near-field coupling of a free-electron beam to optical whispering gallery modes of dielectric microresonators. The cavity-enhanced interaction with these optically excited modes imprints a strong phase modulation on co-propagating electrons, which leads to electron-energy sidebands up to hundreds of photon orders and a spectral broadening of 700 eV. Mapping the near-field interaction with ultrashort electron pulses in space and time, we trace the temporal ring-down of the microresonator following a femtosecond excitation and observe the cavitys resonant spectral response. Resonantly enhancing the coupling of electrons and light via optical cavities, with efficient injection and extraction, can open up novel applications such as continuous-wave acceleration, attosecond structuring, and real-time all-optical electron detection.
In situ generation of a high-energy, high-current, spin-polarized electron beam is an outstanding scientific challenge to the development of plasma-based accelerators for high-energy colliders. In this Letter we show how such a spin-polarized relativistic beam can be produced by ionization injection of electrons of certain atoms with a circularly polarized laser field into a beam-driven plasma wakefield accelerator, providing a much desired one-step solution to this challenge. Using time-dependent Schrodinger equation (TDSE) simulations, we show the propensity rule of spin-dependent ionization of xenon atoms can be reversed in the strong-field multi-photon regime compared with the non-adiabatic tunneling regime, leading to high total spin-polarization. Furthermore, three-dimensional particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations are incorporated with TDSE simulations, providing start-to-end simulations of spin-dependent strong-field ionization of xenon atoms and subsequent trapping, acceleration, and preservation of electron spin-polarization in lithium plasma. We show the generation of a high-current (0.8 kA), ultra-low-normalized-emittance (~37 nm), and high-energy (2.7 GeV) electron beam within just 11 cm distance, with up to ~31% net spin polarization. Higher current, energy, and net spin-polarization beams are possible by optimizing this concept, thus solving a long-standing problem facing the development of plasma accelerators.
Compact laser-driven accelerators are versatile and powerful tools of unarguable relevance on societal grounds for the diverse purposes of science, health, security, and technology because they bring enormous practicality to state-of-the-art achievements of conventional radio-frequency accelerators. Current benchmarking laser-based technologies rely on a medium to assist the light-matter interaction, which impose material limitations or strongly inhomogeneous fields. The advent of few cycle ultra-intense radially polarized lasers has materialized an extensively studied novel accelerator that adopts the simplest form of laser acceleration and is unique in requiring no medium to achieve strong longitudinal energy transfer directly from laser to particle. Here we present the first observation of direct longitudinal laser acceleration of non-relativistic electrons that undergo highly-directional multi-GeV/m accelerating gradients. This demonstration opens a new frontier for direct laser-driven particle acceleration capable of creating well collimated and relativistic attosecond electron bunches and x-ray pulses.
The measurement of transient optical fields has proven critical to understanding the dynamical mechanisms underlying ultrafast physical and chemical phenomena, and is key to realizing higher speeds in electronics and telecommunications. Complete characterization of optical waveforms, however, requires an optical oscilloscope capable of resolving the electric field oscillations with sub-femtosecond resolution and with single-shot operation. Here, we show that strong-field nonlinear excitation of photocurrents in a silicon-based image sensor chip can provide the sub-cycle optical gate necessary to characterize carrier-envelope phase-stable optical waveforms in the mid-infrared. By mapping the temporal delay between an intense excitation and weak perturbing pulse onto a transverse spatial coordinate of the image sensor, we show that the technique allows single-shot measurement of few-cycle waveforms.
We theoretically show that a single free electron in circular/spiral motion radiates an electromagnetic wave possessing helical phase structure and carrying orbital angular momentum. We experimentally demonstrate it by double-slit diffraction on radiation from relativistic electrons in spiral motion. We show that twisted photons should be created naturally by cyclotron/synchrotron radiations or Compton scatterings in various situations in cosmic space. We propose promising laboratory vortex photon sources in various wavelengths ranging from radio wave to gamma-rays.
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