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The generation of harmonic radiation through a non-linear mechanism driven by bunching at fundamental frequency is an important option in the operation of high gain Free-Electron Lasers (FELs). The use of harmonic generation at a large scale facility may result in achieving shorter radiation wavelengths for the same electron beam energy. This paper describes a theory of second harmonic generation in planar undulators with particular attention to X-Ray FELs (XFELs). Our study is based on an exact analytical solution of Maxwell equations, derived with the help of the Green's function method. On the contrary, up-to-date theoretical understanding of the second harmonic generation is only limited to some estimation of the total radiation power based on the source part of the wave equation. Moreover, we find that such part of the wave equation is presented with several incorrect manipulations among which is the omission of an important contribution. Our work yields correct parametric dependencies and specific predictions of additional properties such as polarization, angular distribution of the radiation intensity and total power. The most surprising prediction is the presence of a vertically polarized part of the second harmonic radiation, whereas up-to-date understanding assumes that the field is horizontally polarized. Altogether, this paper presents the first correct theory of second harmonic generation for high gain FELs.

Ultrashort flashes of THz light with low photon energies of a few meV, but strong electric or magnetic field transients have recently been employed to prepare various fascinating nonequilibrium states in matter. Here we present a new class of sources based on superradiant enhancement of radiation from relativistic electron bunches in a compact electron accelerator that we believe will revolutionize experiments in this field. Our prototype source generates high-field THz pulses at unprecedented quasi-continuous-wave repetition rates up to the MHz regime. We demonstrate parameters that exceed state-of-the-art laser-based sources by more than 2 orders of magnitude. The peak fields and the repetition rates are highly scalable and once fully operational this type of sources will routinely provide 1 MV/cm electric fields and 0.3 T magnetic fields at repetition rates of few 100 kHz. We benchmark the unique properties by performing a resonant coherent THz control experiment with few 10 fs resolution.

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