Could lasers boost the energy of particle accelerators?

Question

My understanding of particle accelerators is that electromagnets are used to accelerate an ion to a very high percentage of light-speed before smashing it into another particle. The higher the energy of the particle, the more dramatic the collision (in terms of subatomic particles "liberated").
Could a high-intensity laser be used to increase the speed or thermal energy of the particle during its pre-collision acceleration?
Or would the particle be too small for a large number of photons to affect it?
If the laser could be utilized, would it be best positioned in front of or behind the particle with respect to the direction of travel?
Any other problems or benefits that come to mind?

Answer 1

Hi Eric,

Remember that magnetic fields can do no work on the particles, they can only guide the particles, and change their direction. The work on the particles has to come from a change in potential. Your understanding of the particle accelerator is otherwise correct.

I think the most common method of increasing the pre-injection energy of the particles is with a standard Vandegraff Generator. Considering the initial boost in energy that you can get from a simple Vandegraff, these are very economical.

Now, once the particle is injected into the accelerator, you want to know if a laser can be used to increase the energy of the particle.

Nice idea, you must either be a physicist or you should consider becoming one ... because yes, new work is looking at using lasers to increase the efficiency of particle accelerators, by decreasing the necessary length of the accelerator by -- get this -- an order of magnitude (!!!)

http://physicsweb.org/articles/news/9/9/15

It's one method that high-energy physicists are looking at for getting particles into the Tera Electron Volt (TeV) regime.

To answer the rest of your question about setup, have a look at this illustration ...
http://physicsweb.org/articles/news/9/9/15/1/050915

If you're interested in this area, this is what they're doing at my school ...
http://www.bama.ua.edu/~hep/experiment/index.shtml

but there are a lot of other great programs around the country in this area.

Answer 2

There is a technique to use a laser to create waves in plasma (ionized gas) by which particles would be accelerated to high energy by riding the wave, much like a surfer. It's called a wake field accelerator.

Answer 3

Yes, this is actually something up-and-coming in accelerator technology. I wasn't aware of this, but looking it up, I found that there are experiments and things underway to accelerate particles even faster using a combination of laser pluses and high-energy plasma wake fields. See the source for more.

Answer 4

well, from what I know, where do you think the extra energy comes from after the collisions?The light would be able to reflect
of the particles but I don't think it what affect it because the particles are already so fast that by subjected to light, no harm is
done to the extremely fast particles. :)