Laboratory Laser Acceleration and High Energy Astrophysics: γ–ray Bursts and Cosmic Rays

Recent experimental progress in laser acceleration of charged particles (electrons) and its associated processes has shown that intense electromagnetic pulses can promptly accelerate charged particles to high energies and that their energy spectrum is quite hard. On the other hand some of the high energy astrophysical phenomena such as extremely high energy cosmic rays and energetic components of γ–ray bursts cry for new physical mechanisms for promptly accelerating particles to high energies. We suggest that the basic physics involved in laser acceleration experiments sheds light on some of the underlying mechanisms and their energy spectral characteristics of the promptly accelerated particles in these high energy astrophysical phenomena.