Carrier-envelope phase stabilization in FEL oscillators

Abstract

Abstract FEL oscillators can produce few-cycle optical pulses with a high-extraction efficiency when the oscillators are operated in the superradiant regime. Such FEL oscillators are unique light sources to explore intense light field science, especially in mid-infrared and longwave infrared where ultrashort pulses for the high-intensity applications are difficult to produce from conventional lasers. Since the laser-matter interaction in the intense field regime is described in terms of the oscillating electric field rather than the instantaneous intensity, the carrier-envelope phase (CEP) must be stabilized in many applications of few-cycle optical pulses to the intense light field science. Stabilization of CEP in FEL oscillators has been proposed with an external seed laser and coherent spontaneous emission from the electron bunches. In this paper, we study CEP stabilization in FEL oscillators assisted by coherent spontaneous emission from electron bunches with numerical simulations.