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A workshop on The Next Generation Gamma-Ray Sources sponsored by the Office of Nuclear Physics at the Department of Energy, was held November 17--19, 2016 in Bethesda, Maryland. The goals of the workshop were to identify basic and applied research opportunities at the frontiers of nuclear physics that would be made possible by the beam capabilities of an advanced laser Compton beam facility. To anchor the scientific vision to realistically achievable beam specifications using proven technologies, the workshop brought together experts in the fields of electron accelerators, lasers, and optics to examine the technical options for achieving the beam specifications required by the most compelling parts of the proposed research programs. An international assembly of participants included current and prospective $\gamma$-ray beam users, accelerator and light-source physicists, and federal agency program managers. Sessions were organized to foster interactions between the beam users and facility developers, allowing for information sharing and mutual feedback between the two groups. The workshop findings and recommendations are summarized in this whitepaper.

A set of ballpark parameters for laser, plasma, and accelerator technologies that define for electron energies reaching as high as TeV are identified. These ballpark parameters are carved out from the fundamental scaling laws that govern laser acceleration, theoretically suggested and experimentally explored over a wide range in the recent years. In the density regime on the order of 10^{16} cm^{-3}, the appropriate laser technology, we find, matches well with that of a highly efficient high fluence LD driven Yb ceramic laser. Further, the collective acceleration technique applies to compactify the beam stoppage stage by adopting the beam-plasma wave deceleration, which contributes to significantly enhance the stopping power and energy recovery capability of the beam. Thus we find the confluence of the needed laser acceleration parameters dictated by these scaling laws and the emerging laser technology. This may herald a new technology in the ultrahigh energy frontier., Comment: 16 pages, 2 figures, 1 table, submitted to AIP Conference Proceedings