We report the first experimental demonstration of a slippage-dominant free-electron laser (FEL) amplifier using a 140-fs full width at half maximum broadband seed laser pulse. The evolution of the longitudinal phase space of a laser seeded FEL amplifier in the slippage-dominant regime was experimentally characterized. We observed, for the first time, that the pulse duration of the FEL is primarily determined by the slippage between the seed laser and the electron beam. With a $\pm$1$\%$ variation in the electron-beam energy, we demonstrated reasonably good longitudinal coherence and a $\pm$2$\%$ spectral tuning range. The experimentally observed temporal and spectral evolution of the slippage-dominant FEL was verified by the numerical simulations.

• Received 21 February 2011

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.85.026404