Laser accelerators

The use of lasers to accelerate particles to ultra-high energies is motivated by the very high electric fields associated with focused laser beams. A number of such schemes have been proposed: for example, microstructures driven by lasers operating in the optical-near infrared frequency range, laser-driven space charge plasma waves, inverse free-electron laser accelerator and the two-beam accelerator. Current status of these schemes is reviewed. Lasers may also find an application in improving the power sources and in focusing very high energy particle beams