Generation of phase - matched coherent point source in plasma media by propagated X-ray laser seeded beam

Abstract

There is a significant interest in developing the coherent table-top X-ray lasers. Advent of plasma-based transient collisional excitation x-ray laser and particular, injection of coherent seeded beam, especially high-order harmonics, has tremendously improved the spatial coherence of such lasers, what allowed them to be the same widely used as synchrotron sources. Here we report experimental founding of unknown interference structure in a spatial profile of the output beam of the two-stage plasma X-ray laser. That allowed us experimental and theoretical discovering a new phenomenon consisted in a generation of phase-matched coherent point source in a laser plasma media by propagated X-ray laser seeded beam. This phenomenon could extend the applications of such x-ray lasers. For explanation of the observed phenomenon a new method of solving the standard system of Maxwell-Bloch equations has been developed. It was found that the interference pattern in the output laser beam was formed due to an emergence of phase-matched coherent virtual point source in the XRL amplifier and could be treated as the first observation of mirage phenomenon, analogous to the optical mirage, but in X-rays. The obtained results bring new comprehension into the physical nature of amplification of X-ray radiation in laser-induced plasma amplifiers and opening new opportunities for X-ray interferometry, holography and other applications, which requiring multiple rigidly phased sources of coherent radiation.