Particle Lazer (D2)

Particle Lazers are the primary directed energy weapons system for most Imperial WarStars and Colonial Battlestars throughout most of the Colonial Defense Fleet. The Z in the spelling of "Laser" stands/represents the Zeta radiation EM frequency utilized within the lazers electron pulse jacket.

Basic concept
The Particle Lazer builds upon the basic concepts of particle acceleration and high impact laser wave emission via the combination of ballisticly accelerated phased exotic energy particles and adjustable energy to matter reaction differentials (from Stun blast to full Incineration)

Basic System Mechanics
The basic system mechanics of most Particle Lazers run on the base principal of the scientific process of phased energy Plasma acceleration is a technique for accelerating charged particles, such as electrons, positrons and ions (and for heavier weapons Muons), using an electric field associated with an electron plasma wave.

The primary wave is created either using super heated stream of electron pulses that coat the plasma stream known as a EM Jacket or through the passage of a very directed and stabilized photon based Laser pulses, this technique is also known as laser plasma acceleration.

During the late 20th century These techniques appeared to earth based humans to offer a way to build high performance particle accelerators of much smaller size than conventional devices at the expense of coherency. Current devices show accelerating gradients several orders of magnitude better than current scientific particle accelerators.

Energy/Gaseous Stage
A standard particle laser plasma consists of a internally stored fluid of positive and negative charged particles, generally created by heating a dilute gas. Under normal conditions the plasma within its stored chamber (energy pak, lazer cannon fuel cell..etc) will be macroscopically neutral, an equal mix of electrons and nucleons in equilibrium. However, if an external electric field is applied, the plasma will separate, with the particles being attracted to the external field. A particle injected into such a plasma would be accelerated by the charge separation, but since the magnitude of this separation is generally similar to that of the external field, nothing is gained in comparison to a system that simply applies the field directly to the particle, which is the case in existing accelerator designs.

Particle Acceleration Stage
What makes the system useful compared to standard light energy lasers is the ability of introducing waves of very high energy charge separation that travel through the plasma. Such a wave can be created by applying a high-power laser or heavy electron pulse or "Jacket" into a properly prepared plasma. As the pulse travels through the plasma, the electric field of the light separates the electrons and nucleons in the same way that an external field would. However, as the electrons are much lighter than the nucleons, they move much further during this short period, leading to a charge separation as in the case of an external field.

As the laser pulse leaves the vicinity, the electrons are pulled back towards the center by the now-remaining positive charge of the ions that did not move. As they "fall" into this positive area they pick up speed, so when they reach the center they "pile up" briefly before losing this energy in collisions and eventually flattening out into a more even distribution.

Although the particles are not moving very quickly during this period, macroscopically it appears that a "bubble" of charge is moving through the plasma at close to the speed of light. The bubble is the region cleared of electrons that is thus positively charged, followed by the region where the electrons fall back into the center and is thus negatively charged. This leads to a small area of very strong potential gradient following the laser pulse.

It is this "wakefield" that is used for particle acceleration. A particle injected into the plasma near the high-density area will experience an acceleration toward (or away) from it, an acceleration that continues as the wakefield travels through the column, until the particle eventually reaches the speed of the wakefield. Even higher energies can be reached by injecting the particle to travel across the face of the wakefield, much like a surfer can travel at speeds much higher than the wave they surf on by traveling across it. Accelerators designed to take advantage of this technique have been referred to colloquially as "surfatron"s.

Beam Emission/Propulsion Mechanics
The Lazer Beam is emitted or rapidly propelled by a process of a pulsed or "Pumped" electroparticle superheated discharge producing a combination of light and semi solidified energy in much the same way as a neon light. It is the Active Laser Medium through which the laser passes, not the laser beam itself, which is visible there. The laser beam crosses the air and marks and creates a impact point upon any form of solid matter (both organic and inorganic).

The gain medium of a laser is a material of controlled purity, size, concentration, and shape, which amplifies both solidifies and focuses the beam by the process of stimulated emission. It can be of any state of matter which includes gas, liquid, solid or plasma. The gain medium absorbs pump energy, which raises some electrons into higher-energy ("excited" or quantum states). Particles can interact with light both by absorbing or by emitting photons. Emission can be spontaneous or stimulated. In the latter case, the photon is emitted in the same direction as the light that is passing by. When the number of particles in one excited state exceeds the number of particles in some lower-energy state, population inversion is achieved and the amount of stimulated emission due to light that passes through is larger than the amount of absorption. Hence, the light is amplified. By itself, this makes an optical amplifier. When an optical amplifier is placed inside a resonant optical cavity, one obtains a laser.

The combined light and radiating heat generated by stimulated emission or Blastwave radius is very similar to the input signal in terms of wavelength, phase waves or simply phase, and polarization. This gives laser light its characteristic coherence, and allows it to maintain the uniform polarization and often monochromaticity established by the optical cavity design.

Blast Yield
Plasma acceleration is categorized into several types according to how the electron plasma wave is formed:
 * plasma wakefield acceleration (PWFA): The electron plasma wave is formed by an electron bunch
 * laser wakefield acceleration (LWFA): A laser pulse is introduced to form an electron plasma wave.
 * laser beat-wave acceleration (LBWA): The electron plasma wave arises based on different frequency generation of two laser pulses.
 * self-modulated laser wakefield acceleration (SMLWFA): The formation of an electron plasma wave is achieved by a laser pulse modulated by stimulated Raman forward scattering instability.

The concept of plasma acceleration was first proposed by Toshiki Tajima and John Dawson in a theoretical article published in 1979. The first experimental demonstration of wakefield acceleration, which was performed with PWFA, was reported by a research group at Argonne National Laboratory in 1988.

Formula
According to the acceleration gradient for a linear plasma wave is


 * $$E = c \cdot \sqrt{\frac{m_e \cdot \rho}{\epsilon_0}}.$$

In this equation, $$E$$ is the electric field, $$c$$ is the speed of light in vacuum, $$m_e$$ is the mass of the electron, $$\rho$$ is the plasma density ( in particles per cube meter), and $$\epsilon_0$$ is the permittivity of free space.