ELISA (Electron Injector for High Energy Accelerator compact Staged): an electron injector for a multi-stage accelerator scheme (collaboration with LPGP University Paris-Sud / LULI-Ecole Polytechnique)

The ELISA project is to develop an experimentally controlled monoenergetic electron source, as an injector for a laser-plasma accelerator multi-stage (see Fig. 1). A dedicated and reliable injector is required for a multistage scheme, which seems to be the most promising compact and controlled way to produce electrons to ultra-relativistic energies. The accelerated electrons will have tunable energy between 10 and 100 MeV , and will be studied in a cell of variable length, filled with a gas mixture for controlling the trapping of electrons by induced ionization injection. Numerical simulations will be perfomed for optimizing the injector based on laser parameters and to describe the coupling and the acceleration of the electron beam produced in a large length  accelerator stage (> 10 cm).