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Plasma density manipulation in staged discharge capillaries for plasma-based accelerators

Angelo Biagioni*, Lucio Crincoli, Romain Demitra, Mario Galletti, Valerio Lollo, Donato Pellegrini, Riccardo Pompili, and Massimo Ferrario

Arie Zigler

  • *Contact author: angelo.biagioni@lnf.infn.it
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Phys. Rev. E 114, 045210 – Published 23 October, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/yrts-62hs

Abstract

Plasma wakefield acceleration of charged particle beams relies on specialized devices for plasma generation and confinement. In both particle-driven wakefield acceleration and beam-focusing experiments, these devices are designed to precisely control plasma properties to optimize beam-plasma interactions. Recent studies employing centimeter-scale, gas-filled discharge plasma sources have demonstrated high accelerating and focusing gradients while preserving electron beam quality, motivating the extension of these techniques to larger structures to achieve higher beam energies. At the SPARC_LAB test facility, multistage accelerating modules based on plasma generation by electrical discharges have been developed to produce tailored longitudinal plasma profiles for simultaneous beam acceleration and focusing. The results presented here show that the longitudinal plasma density within each stage can be independently tuned by modifying the plasma generation conditions, including the applied voltage, current pulse parameters, discharge ignition timing, and plasma recombination dynamics.

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Phys. Rev. E 114, 045210– Published 23 October, 2026
  • Received 28 November 2025
  • Revised 10 March 2026
  • Accepted 6 October 2026
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

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