Amplification of beam acceleration in a plasma by plasma instability

Although achieving of high accelerating field in a plasma has been demonstrated experimentally, a practical use of such a scheme for building a large accelerator is questionable. A novel scheme of beam acceleration by a plasma wave is considered in this article. The scheme is based on an initial excitation of a plasma wave by a probe beam with comparatively modest intensity. This seed excitation is then amplified by plasma instability, so that the test beam which follows the probe beam with a small delay will be accelerated by the plasma wave with an amplitude significantly exceeding the initial amplitude of the wave. Because of small interaction between the synchronization beam and the plasma, such a scheme allows one to excite a plasma over large length and, consequently, to build a large accelerator.