The brightest lights in the world create a new future by providing compact particle accelerators and extremely short x-ray radiations. The interactions between ultra-short ultra-intense lasers and plasma in the present pave the way for the development of future particle colliders, tabletop synchrotrons, and atomic recorders for materials, which will offer new opportunities in physics and the sciences.

This book will describe the laser-plasma interactions that are driven by ultrashort ultra-intense lasers, such as electron acceleration, ion acceleration, and radiation generation. Each topic will be described from its fundamental principles to its current status, focusing on novices in this field. In addition, some instructions for constructing such sources will be provided, as well as problems for practicing the design of laser-plasma sources.

Hyung Taek Kim is a head research scientist in the Advanced Photonics Research Institute (APRI), GIST. He got a Ph.D. from the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology in 2004. Since joined Ultrashort Quantum Beam Facility, APRI in 2005, he has studied various applications of intense laser pulses, such as high-order harmonics, x-ray lasers, x-ray imaging, filamentation, laser wakefield acceleration, and gamma-ray generations. He led laser wakefield acceleration experiments as a research fellow at Center for Relativistic Laser Science (CoReLS), Institute for Basic Science (IBS). He has been the director of the Research Center for Plasma Applications with Ultraintense Lasers (PAUL center), APRI, since 2022.