Interaction between relativistic charged particles and an extended strong rf field

An investigation is made of the interaction between relativistic charged particles and a high-intensity microwave electric field over long interaction lengths. The microwave field has no magnetic component over the entire interaction length. It is shown that the interaction of the relativistic particles has features which depend on the relation between the incoming particle energy and the field strength. In particular, part of a monoenergetic particle beam may be accelerated by the beam’s own energy with some of the energy being transferred from the beam to the field.