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QED cascade saturation in extreme high fields
Upcoming ultrahigh power lasers at 10 PW level will make it possible to experimentally explore electron-positron (e(−)e(+)) pair cascades and subsequent relativistic e(−)e(+) jets formation, which are supposed to occur in extreme astrophysical environments, such as black holes, pulsars, quasars and...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Nature Publishing Group UK
2018
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5976799/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29849072 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-26785-8 |
Sumario: | Upcoming ultrahigh power lasers at 10 PW level will make it possible to experimentally explore electron-positron (e(−)e(+)) pair cascades and subsequent relativistic e(−)e(+) jets formation, which are supposed to occur in extreme astrophysical environments, such as black holes, pulsars, quasars and gamma-ray bursts. In the latter case it is a long-standing question as to how the relativistic jets are formed and what their temperatures and compositions are. Here we report simulation results of pair cascades in two counter-propagating QED-strong laser fields. A scaling of QED cascade growth with laser intensity is found, showing clear cascade saturation above threshold intensity of ~10(24) W/cm(2). QED cascade saturation leads to pair plasma cooling and longitudinal compression along the laser axis, resulting in the subsequent formation of relativistic dense e(−)e(+) jets along transverse directions. Such laser-driven QED cascade saturation may open up the opportunity to study energetic astrophysical phenomena in laboratory. |
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