This project aims to provide a better understanding of how one can use an external laser field to control, influence and even create matter. The research team has developed sophisticated algorithms to perform computer simulations to visualize the motion of electrons and other particles with full spatial and temporal resolution. The computer simulations also predict that if the strength of the laser radiation is very high, this radiation can convert itself to matter in the form of electrons and positrons. In other words, the energy of laser light can be converted directly into matter. This important process is fundamentally not well understood and has not been observed in a laboratory yet. The computer simulations may provide guidance for the planned laser experiments in Europe, Asia and the US. This multinational research effort might lead to new ways to control atomic, chemical and even biological processes on very short time scales.
An important mission for the grant is also to give undergraduate students the opportunity to gain research experience. This educational experience provides them with important skills including working as a team, gaining the endurance, intellectual flexibility and experience to tackle serious research problems, and communicating results in conferences and publications.
From a technical point of view, the large-scale computer simulations solve the quantum field theoretical Dirac equation non-perturbatively on a space-time lattice. They are performed at the XSEDE supercomputer cluster (Stampede) in Texas. Up to this point almost all theories about the electron-positron pair creation process have neglected the interfermionic forces for this process. The goal of the current grant is to provide a first quantitative assessment of the impact of these forces due to a classical electromagnetic field whose temporal evolution is governed by the Maxwell equations.
