  A cascaded ion acceleration scheme is proposed by use of ultrashort
laser-irradiated microtubes. When the electrons of a microtube are blown away
by intense laser pulses, strong charge-separation electric fields are formed in
the microtube both along the axial and along the radial directions. By
controlling the time delay between the laser pulses and a pre-accelerated
proton beam injected along the microtube axis, we demonstrate that this proton
beam can be further accelerated by the transient axial electric field in the
laser-irradiated microtube. Moreover, the collimation of the injected proton
beam can be enhanced by the inward radial electric field. Numerical simulations
show that this cascaded ion acceleration scheme works efficiently even at
non-relativistic laser intensities, and it can be applied to injected proton
beams in the energy range from 1 to 100 MeV. Therefore, it is particularly
suitable for cascading acceleration of protons to higher energy.
