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abstract:
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Recent advances in high brightness rf gun technology,
coupled with novel laser systems and architecture have
enabled the development of a new class of compact,
tunable, monochromatic light sources capable of
producing MeV photons with unprecedented brightness.
Such new sources rely on Thomson scattering of incident
photons produced by a TW-class laser off a bright
relativistic electron beam to generate Doppler-upshifted
photons in a highly collimated beam. Scaling laws [1]
show that a frequency-doubled, 532 nm wavelength, 1 J,
10 ps Fourier transform-limited drive laser pulse
interacting with a 250 MeV, 1 nC, 10 ps, 1 mm.mrad
normalized emittance, with 0.1% relative energy spread,
can yield a 2.24 MeV γ-ray flash with a peak brightness
exceeding 1023 photons/[mm2 x mrad2 x s x 0.1%
bandwidth]. This number is > 15 orders of magnitude
beyond the output of a third-generation synchrotron at the
same photon energy. Above ~ 100 keV, the photons can
interact with nuclei, and nuclear applications become
viable. In this paper, we present a technical overview of T-
REX sources and their capabilities, and give a few
examples of potential applications of interest.
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