Superradiant terahertz Smith-Purcell radiation from surface plasmon excited by counterstreaming electron beams

Abstract

The authors show that evanescent tunneling transmission of effective surface plasmon polaritons between two counterstreaming electron beams noticeably increases Smith-Purcell radiation (SPR) intensity by about two orders of magnitude as well as lower its transition threshold from a spontaneous emission to a stimulated one. An emission mechanism of the superradiant SPR is theoretically analyzed by the dielectric conversion of the structured metal surface and the boundary matching condition of Maxwell's equations in comparison with numerical simulations. © 2007 American Institute of Physics.