A Comparison of Short Rayleigh Range FEL Performance with Simulations

One approach to attaining very high power in a free-electron laser (FEL) is to operate with a Rayleigh range much smaller than the wiggler length. Previously, 3D simulations of Free-electron laser (FEL) oscillators showed that FEL gain doesn't fall off with Rayleigh range as predicted by one-dimensional simulations*. They also predict that the angular tolerance for the mirrors is much large than simplistic theory predicts. Using the IR Upgrade laser at Jefferson Lab lasing at 935 nm we have studied the performance of an FEL with very short Rayleigh range. We also looked at the angular sensitivity for several different Rayleigh ranges. We find very good agreement between simulations and measured gain and angular sensitivities. Surprisingly the gain continues to rise as the Rayleigh range is shortened and continues to grow even when the resonator becomes geometrically unstable. The same behavior is seen in both the experiment and simulations.