A spectrometer for ultrashort gamma-ray pulses with photon energies greater than 10 MeV

K. T. Behm, J. M. Cole, A. S. Joglekar, E. Gerstmayr, J. C. Wood, C. D. Baird, T. G. Blackburn, M. Duff, C. Harvey, A. Ilderton, S. Kuschel, S. P.D. Mangles, M. Marklund, P. McKenna, C. D. Murphy, Z. Najmudin, K. Poder, C. P. Ridgers, G. Sarri, G. M. SamarinD. Symes, J. Warwick, M. Zepf, K. Krushelnick, A. G.R. Thomas

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

We present a design for a pixelated scintillator based gamma-ray spectrometer for non-linear inverse Compton scattering experiments. By colliding a laser wakefield accelerated electron beam with a tightly focused, intense laser pulse, gamma-ray photons up to 100 MeV energies and with few femtosecond duration may be produced. To measure the energy spectrum and angular distribution, a 33 × 47 array of cesium-iodide crystals was oriented such that the 47 crystal length axis was parallel to the gamma-ray beam and the 33 crystal length axis was oriented in the vertical direction. Using an iterative deconvolution method similar to the YOGI code, modeling of the scintillator response using GEANT4 and fitting to a quantum Monte Carlo calculated photon spectrum, we are able to extract the gamma ray spectra generated by the inverse Compton interaction.

Original languageEnglish
Article number113303
Number of pages9
JournalReview of Scientific Instruments
Volume89
Issue number11
Early online date6 Nov 2018
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 6 Nov 2018

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