Corrugated Plasma Waveguides — Optical Slow Wave Structures.

We report the generation of extremely stable and reproducible corrugated hydrogen, nitrogen, and argon plasma waveguides up to 1.5 cm in length with corrugation period as short as 40μm and relative modulation amplitudes up to ∼20%. The waveguides are generated by projecting axially modulated Bessel beams onto uniform and extended cryogenic cluster jet flows. These waveguides are ‘slow wave’ guiding structures capable of supporting intense pulses with sub-light phase velocities, with application to direct laser acceleration of charged particles and phase-matched generation of a wide spectrum of electromagnetic radiation. These plasma structures support guided propagation at intensities limited only by our current laser energy. © 2006 American Institute of Physics [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]