High-Harmonic Generation and Correlated Electron Emission from Relativistic Plasma Mirrors at 1 kHz Repetition Rate

We report evidence for the first generation of XUV spectra from relativistic surface high-harmonic generation (SHHG) on plasma mirrors at a kilohertz repetition rate, emitted simultaneously with energetic electrons. SHHG spectra and electron angular distributions are measured as a function of the experimentally controlled plasma density gradient scale length $L_\mathrm{g}$ for three increasingly short and intense driving pulses: 24~fs and $a_0=1.1$, 8~fs and $a_0=1.6$, and finally 4~fs and $a_0\approx2.1$, where $a_0$ is the peak vector potential normalized by $m_\mathrm{e} c/e$ with the elementary charge $e$, the electron rest mass $m_\mathrm{e}$, and the vacuum light velocity $c$. For all driver pulses, we observe correlated relativistic SHHG and electron emission in the range $L_\mathrm{g}\in[\lambda/25,\lambda/5]$, with an optimum gradient scale length of $L_\mathrm{g}\approx\lambda/10$.