Laser wakefield acceleration in nanostructured plasmas

Solid-state plasma wakefield acceleration has recently attracted attention as a novel method for achieving unprecedented ultrahigh acceleration gradients on the order of 1 TeV/m or beyond. In this context, recent advancements in nanofabrication techniques have opened up the possibility of creating structured plasmas with tailored properties. For instance, the utilization of carbon nanotube (CNT) bundles holds great potential for generating stable plasmas with electron densities reaching as high as 10²² 10 22 cm⁻³ cm - 3 , i.e., orders of magnitude higher than conventional gaseous plasmas. As part of a new collaborative effort called NanoAc, we have conducted particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations to investigate laser wakefield acceleration in nanostructured solid-state plasmas based on CNT arrays. Our results confirm the attainment of wakefields at the TV/m scale. Additionally, we observed self-injection, sub-femtosecond bunch formation, and electron acceleration in micrometer-scale targets, yielding kinetic energies on the order of a few tens of MeV. These findings open up promising possibilities to design novel ultracompact accelerators and radiation sources. In this paper, we report recent simulation results from the NanoAc collaboration and describe ongoing efforts toward future experimental tests at available laser facilities.