Capture and transport of electron beams from plasma injectors

Electron beams produced by laser-plasma interaction are arousing a strong interest in the conventional accelerator community, considering their high initial energy and their strong beam current. Using adequate beam shaping might make their characteristics comparable to those obtained in traditional accelerator facilities based on RF technology. Moreover, the advantages of using laser-plasma electron beams can be expressed in terms of size and cost of the global accelerating infrastructure. However, improvements are still necessary since, currently, the laser-accelerated beams are characterized by a large energy spread and a high beam divergence that degrades quickly the good initial electron beam properties and makes these sources not yet suitable to replace conventional accelerators. In this paper, we report on the progress of the study related to capture, shape and transport of laser generated electrons by means of tracking codes. In particular, our study has focused on laser-generated electrons obtained nowadays by conventional multi-hundred TW laser systems and on numerical predictions. For this, we have analyzed different lattice structures, working on the optimization of the capture and transport of laser-accelerated electrons. Results are shown and discussed, together with open problems.