Milestone on the path to laser-driven plasma accelerators

An innovative accelerator project at DESY has produced its first electron beam. The experimental facility goes by the name of LUX and is being operated in collaboration with the University of Hamburg. It is based on the promising technology of plasma wakefield acceleration which will hopefully one day give rise to smaller and more powerful particle accelerators. During a first test run, LUX was able to accelerate electrons to about 400 mega-electronvolts, using a plasma cell that is just a few m