Circumventing the Dephasing and Depletion Limits of Laser-Wakefield Acceleration

Compact electron accelerators are paramount to next-generation synchrotron light sources and free-electron lasers, as well as for advanced accelerators at the TeV energy frontier. Recent progress in laser-plasma driven accelerators (LPA) has extended their electron energies to the multi-GeV range and improved beam stability for insertion devices. However, the subluminal group velocity of plasma waves limits the final electron energy that can be achieved in a single LPA accelerator stage, also known as the dephasing limit. Here, we present the first laser-plasma driven electron accelerator concept providing constant acceleration without electrons outrunning the wakefield. The laser driver is provided by an overlap region of two obliquely incident, ultrashort laser pulses with tilted pulse fronts in the line foci of two cylindrical mirrors, aligned to coincide with the trajectory of the accelerated electrons. Such a geometry of laterally coupling the laser into a plasma allows for the overlap region to move with the vacuum speed of light, while the laser fields in the plasma are continuously being replenished by the successive parts of the laser pulses. Our scheme is robust against parasitic self-injection and self-phase modulation as well as drive-laser depletion and defocusing along the accelerated electron beam. It works for a broad range of plasma densities in gas targets. This method opens the way for scaling up electron energies beyond 10 GeV, possibly towards TeV-scale electron beams, without the need for multiple laser-accelerator stages.