Abstract

Many schemes for laser acceleration of elementary particles have been suggested and discussed; see, e.g., Ref. 1 and references therein. For the inverse Čherenkov effect schemes (which allow for acceleration of the first order in the laser field strength E) one must focus a powerful laser beam inside a medium with a nonzero deviation of the refractive index from the vacuum one; optical breakdown is an evident obstacle.

© 1995 Optical Society of America