Quasi-monoenergetic electron beams accelerated beyond 2 GeV with the APOLLON laser

A team of researchers from the Laboratoire d’Optique Appliquée (LOA, ENSTA, CNRS, École Polytechnique, Institut Polytechnique de Paris) and CEA has successfully generated quasi-monoenergetic electron beams exceeding 2 GeV using a petawatt-class laser.

Conducted at the Apollon laser facility, this study, published in Physical Review Accelerators and Beams, combines controlled injection and laser guiding in a plasma waveguide, increasing acceleration length and beam quality.

These findings offer promising prospects for the development of compact accelerators, with potential applications in fundamental physics, and free-electron lasers.

Figure: Angularly resolved electron spectra obtained with guiding and shock-assisted ionization injection. Below are the same two spectra but angularly integrated.

Find the open-access publication here:

Lahaye et al., Quasimonoenergetic multi-GeV electron acceleration in a plasma waveguide, Phys. Rev. Accel. Beams 28, 091301 (2025).