Proposal for a high brightness γ-ray source at the SXFEL

High brightness γ-rays produced by laser Compton scattering (LCS) are ideal probes for the study of nucleon and nuclear structure. We propose such a γ-ray source using the backscattering of a laser from the bright electron beam produced by the linac of the Shanghai Soft X-ray Free-electron Laser (SXFEL) test facility at the Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics (SINAP). The performance is optimized through theoretical analysis and benchmarked with 4D Monte-Carlo simulations. The peak brightness of the source is expected to be larger than 2×1022 photons/(mm2 mrad2 s 0.1%BW) and photon energy ranges from 3.7 MeV to 38.9 MeV. Its performance, compared to Extreme Light Infrastructure-Nuclear Physics (ELI-NP), and the Shanghai Laser-Electron Gamma-ray Source (SLEGS), is given. The potential for basic and applied research is also briefly outlined.