Tailoring the amplification of attosecond pulse through detuned X-ray FEL undulator

Abstract

We demonstrate that the amplification of attosecond pulse in Xray free electron laser (FEL) undulator can be tailored. The characteristic of the amplification of an isolated attosecond pulse in the FEL undulator is investigated. An isolated 180 attoseconds full width half maximum (FWHM) pulse at 1.25 nm with a spectral bandwidth of 1% is injected into an undulator. The simulation results show that for a direct seeding of 3MW, the seed is amplified to the peak power of 106 GW (40 mu J, an output pulse-width of 383 attoseconds) in the presence of a detuning at FEL resonance condition in 100-m long undulator. We note that the introduction of detuning leads to the better performance compared to the case without detuning: shorter by 15.5% in a pulse-width and higher by 76.6% in an output power. Tapering yields a higher power (116% increases in the output power compared to the case without detuning) but a longer pulse (15.4% longer in the pulse-width). It was observed that +/- Delta lambda(r)/8 (Delta lambda(r)/lambda(r) similar to 1%) is the maximum degree of detuning, beyond which the amplification becomes poor: lower in the output power and longer in the pulse duration. The minimum power for a seed pulse needs to be higher than 1 MW for the successful amplification of an attosecond pulse at 1.25 nm. Also, the electron beam energy-spread must be less than 0.1% for a suitable propagation of attosecond pulse along the FEL undulator under this study. (C) 2015 Optical Society of America