---
OA_place: repository
OA_type: green
_id: '21673'
abstract:
- lang: eng
  text: 'When impinging on optical structures or passing in their vicinity, free electrons
    can spontaneously emit electromagnetic radiation, a phenomenon generally known
    as cathodoluminescence. Free-electron radiation comes in many guises: Cherenkov,
    transition, and Smith-Purcell radiation, but also electron scintillation, commonly
    referred to as incoherent cathodoluminescence. While those effects have been at
    the heart of many fundamental discoveries and technological developments in high-energy
    physics in the past century, their recent demonstration in photonic and nanophotonic
    systems has attracted a lot of attention. Those developments arose from predictions
    that exploit nanophotonics for novel radiation regimes, now becoming accessible
    thanks to advances in nanofabrication. In general, the proper design of nanophotonic
    structures can enable shaping, control, and enhancement of free-electron radiation,
    for any of the above-mentioned effects. Free-electron radiation in nanophotonics
    opens the way to promising applications, such as widely-tunable integrated light
    sources from x-ray to THz frequencies, miniaturized particle accelerators, and
    highly sensitive high-energy particle detectors. Here, we review the emerging
    field of free-electron radiation in nanophotonics. We first present a general,
    unified framework to describe free-electron light-matter interaction in arbitrary
    nanophotonic systems. We then show how this framework sheds light on the physical
    underpinnings of many methods in the field used to control and enhance free-electron
    radiation. Namely, the framework points to the central role played by the photonic
    eigenmodes in controlling the output properties of free-electron radiation (e.g.,
    frequency, directionality, and polarization). [... see full abstract in paper]'
article_number: '2208.02368'
article_processing_charge: No
arxiv: 1
author:
- first_name: Charles
  full_name: Roques-Carmes, Charles
  id: e2e68fc9-6505-11ef-a541-eb4e72cc3e82
  last_name: Roques-Carmes
- first_name: Steven E.
  full_name: Kooi, Steven E.
  last_name: Kooi
- first_name: Yi
  full_name: Yang, Yi
  last_name: Yang
- first_name: Nicholas
  full_name: Rivera, Nicholas
  last_name: Rivera
- first_name: Phillip D.
  full_name: Keathley, Phillip D.
  last_name: Keathley
- first_name: John D.
  full_name: Joannopoulos, John D.
  last_name: Joannopoulos
- first_name: Steven G.
  full_name: Johnson, Steven G.
  last_name: Johnson
- first_name: Ido
  full_name: Kaminer, Ido
  last_name: Kaminer
- first_name: Karl K.
  full_name: Berggren, Karl K.
  last_name: Berggren
- first_name: Marin
  full_name: Soljačić, Marin
  last_name: Soljačić
citation:
  ama: Roques-Carmes C, Kooi SE, Yang Y, et al. Free-electron-light interactions in
    nanophotonics. <i>arXiv</i>. doi:<a href="https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2208.02368">10.48550/arXiv.2208.02368</a>
  apa: Roques-Carmes, C., Kooi, S. E., Yang, Y., Rivera, N., Keathley, P. D., Joannopoulos,
    J. D., … Soljačić, M. (n.d.). Free-electron-light interactions in nanophotonics.
    <i>arXiv</i>. <a href="https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2208.02368">https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2208.02368</a>
  chicago: Roques-Carmes, Charles, Steven E. Kooi, Yi Yang, Nicholas Rivera, Phillip
    D. Keathley, John D. Joannopoulos, Steven G. Johnson, Ido Kaminer, Karl K. Berggren,
    and Marin Soljačić. “Free-Electron-Light Interactions in Nanophotonics.” <i>ArXiv</i>,
    n.d. <a href="https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2208.02368">https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2208.02368</a>.
  ieee: C. Roques-Carmes <i>et al.</i>, “Free-electron-light interactions in nanophotonics,”
    <i>arXiv</i>. .
  ista: Roques-Carmes C, Kooi SE, Yang Y, Rivera N, Keathley PD, Joannopoulos JD,
    Johnson SG, Kaminer I, Berggren KK, Soljačić M. Free-electron-light interactions
    in nanophotonics. arXiv, 2208.02368.
  mla: Roques-Carmes, Charles, et al. “Free-Electron-Light Interactions in Nanophotonics.”
    <i>ArXiv</i>, 2208.02368, doi:<a href="https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2208.02368">10.48550/arXiv.2208.02368</a>.
  short: C. Roques-Carmes, S.E. Kooi, Y. Yang, N. Rivera, P.D. Keathley, J.D. Joannopoulos,
    S.G. Johnson, I. Kaminer, K.K. Berggren, M. Soljačić, ArXiv (n.d.).
date_created: 2026-04-09T09:10:41Z
date_published: 2022-08-03T00:00:00Z
date_updated: 2026-04-13T09:42:12Z
day: '03'
doi: 10.48550/arXiv.2208.02368
extern: '1'
external_id:
  arxiv:
  - '2208.02368'
language:
- iso: eng
main_file_link:
- open_access: '1'
  url: https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2208.02368
month: '08'
oa: 1
oa_version: Preprint
publication: arXiv
publication_status: submitted
scopus_import: '1'
status: public
title: Free-electron-light interactions in nanophotonics
type: preprint
user_id: 2DF688A6-F248-11E8-B48F-1D18A9856A87
year: '2022'
...