Researchers hit milestone in accelerating particles with plasma

Frank Tsung and Weiming An/UCLA. Computer simulation of a wake produced by an intense electron bunch as it passes through an ionized gas from left to right. Researchers from UCLA and the Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have shown that a promising technique for accelerating electrons on waves of plasma is efficient enough to power a new generation of shorter, more economical accelerators. This could greatly expand their use in areas such as medicine, national security, industry and high-energy physics research. This achievement is a milestone in demonstrating the practicality of plasma wakefield acceleration, a technique in which electrons gain energy by essentially surfing on a wave of electrons within an ionized gas. Using SLAC's Facility for Advanced Accelerator Experimental Tests , a Department of Energy Office of Science User Facility, the researchers boosted bunches of electrons to energies 400 to 500 times higher than they could reach traveling the same distance in a conventional accelerator. Just as important, energy was transferred to the electrons much more efficiently than in previous experiments.