Evidence for Microbunching “Sidebands” in a Saturated Free-Electron Laser Using Coherent Optical Transition Radiation

We report the first measurements of z-dependent coherent optical transition radiation (COTR) due to electron-beam microbunching at high gains ( >10⁴) including saturation of a self-amplified spontaneous emission free-electron laser (FEL). In these experiments the fundamental wavelength was near 530 nm, and the COTR spectra exhibit the transition from simple spectra to complex spectra ( 5% spectral width) after saturation. The COTR intensity growth and angular distribution data are reported as well as the evidence for transverse spectral dependencies and an “effective” core of the beam being involved in microbunching.