Muon beams of low emittance provide the basis for the intense, well-characterised neutrino beams necessary to elucidate the physics of flavour at a neutrino factory and to provide lepton-antilepton collisions at energies of up to several TeV at a muon collider. The international Muon Ionization Cooling Experiment (MICE) aims to demonstrate ionization cooling, the technique by which it is proposed to reduce the phase-space volume occupied by the muon beam at such facilities. In an ionization-cooling channel, the muon beam passes through a material in which it loses energy. The energy lost is then replaced using RF cavities. The combined effect of energy loss and re-acceleration is to reduce the transverse emittance of the beam (transverse cooling). A major revision of the scope of the project was carried out over the summer of 2014. The revised experiment can deliver a demonstration of ionization cooling. The design of the cooling demonstration experiment will be described together with its predicted cooling performance.
The threshold of the transverse mode coupling instability is calculated in framework of the square well model at arbitrary value of space charge tune shift. A new method of calculation is developed beyond the traditional expansion technique. The square, resistive, and exponential wakes are investigated. It is shown that the instability threshold goes up indefinitely when the tune shift increases. A comparison with conventional case of the parabolic potential well is performed.
This paper compares measurements and calculations of scattering of photons from technical vacuum chamber surfaces typical of accelerators. Synchrotron radiation generated by a charged particle beam in the accelerator is either absorbed, specularly reflected, or scattered by the vacuum chamber surface. This phenomenon has important implications on the operation of the accelerator. Measurements of photon scattering were made at the BESSY-II synchrotron radiation facility using samples of aluminum vacuum chamber from Cornell electron storage ring (CESR). A description of the analytic model used in the calculation is given, which takes into account the reflectivity of the material, the surface features of the sample, the wavelengths and the incident angles of the photons. The surface properties used in these calculations were obtained from measurements made from an atomic force microscope.
In this article a new analytical description of the effective interaction potential for a charged particle in the field of two interfering laser beams is presented. The potential dependence on the lasers intensities, orientation and parameters of the particle entering the considered system is analyzed. It is shown for the case of arbitrary lasers crossing angle that for different values of projectile velocity the attracting potential becomes a scattering one so that the channel axes and borders interchange each other. In addition the projectile radiation spectral distribution is given and general estimations on the expected beam radiation yield are outlined.
Inverse Compton scattering of laser photons by ultrarelativistic electron beam provides polarized x- to gamma-ray pulses due to the Doppler blueshifting. Nonlinear electrodynamics in the relativistically intense linearly polarized laser field changes the radiation kinetics established during the Compton interaction. These are due to the induced figure-8 motion, which introduces an overall redshift in the radiation spectrum, with the concomitant emission of higher order harmonics. To experimentally analyze the strong field physics associated with the nonlinear electron-laser interaction, clear modifications to the angular and wavelength distributions of x rays are observed. The relativistic photon wave field is provided by the ps CO2 laser of peak normalized vector potential of 0.5 < a(L) < 0.7, which due to the quadratic dependence of the strength of nonlinear phenomena on a(L) permits sufficient effects not observed in past 2nd harmonic study with a(L) approximate to 0.3 laser [M. Babzien et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 96, 054802 (2006)]. The angular spectral characteristics are revealed using K-, L-edge, and high energy attenuation filters. The observation indicates existence of the electrons' longitudinal motion through frequency redshifting understood as the mass shift effect. Thus, the 3rd harmonic radiation has been observed containing on-axis x-ray component that is directly associated with the induced figure-8 motion. These are further supported by an initial evidence of off-axis 2nd harmonic radiation produced in a circularly polarized laser wave field. Total x-ray photon number per pulse, scattered by 65 MeV electron beam of 0.3 nC, at the interaction point is measured to be approximately 10(9).
In long gap tunable undulators, strong magnetic forces always lead to some amount of gap-dependent girder deformation and resulting gap-dependent phase errors. For the undulators for the European XFEL, this problem has been investigated thoroughly and quantitatively. Using the different gap dependencies of suitable shims and pole height tuning, a method is presented which can be applied to reduce the overall gap dependence of the phase error if needed. It is exemplified by tuning one of the undulator segments for the European X-Ray Free Electron Laser back to specs.
We present the design of a volumetric metamaterial (MTM) structure and its interaction with a relativistic electron beam. This novel structure has promising applications in particle beam diagnostics, acceleration, and microwave generation. The volumetric MTM has a cubic unit cell allowing structures of arbitrary size to be configured as an array of identical cells. This structure allows the exploration of the properties of a metamaterial structure without having to consider substrates or other supporting elements. The dispersion characteristics of the unit cell are obtained using eigenmode simulations in the hfss code and also using an effective medium theory with spatial dispersion. Good agreement is obtained between these two approaches. The lowest-order mode of the MTM structure is found to have a negative group velocity in all directions of propagation. The frequency spectrum of the radiation from a relativistic electron beam passing through the MTM structure is calculated analytically and also calculated with the cst code, with very good agreement. The radiation pattern from the relativistic electron beam is found to be backward Cherenkov radiation, which is a promising tool for particle diagnostics. Calculations are also presented for the application of a MTM-based wakefield accelerator as a possible all-metal replacement for the conventional dielectric wakefield structure. The proposed structure may also be useful for MTM-based vacuum electron devices for microwave generation and amplification.
The microbunching instability (MBI) is a well-known problem for high brightness electron beams and has been observed at accelerator facilities around the world. Free-electron lasers (FELs) are particularly susceptible to MBI, which can distort the longitudinal phase space and increase the beam’s slice energy spread (SES). Past studies of MBI at the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) relied on optical transition radiation to infer the existence of microbunching. With the development of the x-band transverse deflecting cavity (XTCAV), we can for the first time directly image the longitudinal phase space at the end of the accelerator and complete a comprehensive study of MBI, revealing both detailed MBI behavior as well as insights into mitigation schemes. The fine time resolution of the XTCAV also provides the first LCLS measurements of the final SES, a critical parameter for many advanced FEL schemes. Detailed MBI and SES measurements can aid in understanding MBI mechanisms, benchmarking simulation codes, and designing future high-brightness accelerators.
Self-seeding is a promising approach to significantly narrow the self-amplified spontaneous emission bandwidth of X-ray free-electron lasers (FELs) and hence to produce nearly transform-limited pulses. We study the radiation propagation through a grating monochromator installed at the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS). The monochromator design is based on a toroidal VLS grating working at a fixed incidence angle mounting without an entrance slit. It covers the spectral range from 500 eV to 1000 eV. The optical system was studied using a wave optics method to evaluate the performance of the self-seeding scheme. Our wave optics analysis takes into account the finite size of the coherent source, third-order aberrations and height error of the optical elements. Two propagation approaches are studied with time-dependent FEL simulations. In addition, the pulse-front tilt phenomenon effect is illustrated.
Smith-Purcell radiation is a well-known phenomenon, which provides a noninvasive scheme for diagnostics of charged particle beams and is used as an effective source of electromagnetic waves, e.g., in the orotron, the free electron laser, etc. In this paper we develop the theory of Smith-Purcell radiation (SPR) for the little-investigated case of arbitrary angles between the charged particle trajectories and the rulings of a grating. The effect of conical diffraction arising here changes drastically the space distribution of the radiation. By contrast to the only existing approach, described by Haeberle et al. [Phys. Rev. E 55, 4675 (1997)], which requires difficult numerical calculations, we give a fully analytic theory of SPR. Also, in this paper we present for the first time the theory of x-ray Smith-Purcell radiation. Evanescent waves on the surface are shown to lead to strong enhancement of Smith-Purcell radiation, through a resonant mechanism. The results are important for the description of real divergent high-brightness beams and for the development of novel noninvasive diagnostic schemes based on the Smith-Purcell effect.
We report the results of experiments on laser-wakefield acceleration in a novel two-stage gas target with independently adjustable density and atomic-composition profiles. We were able to tailor these profiles in a way that led to the separation of the processes of electron injection and acceleration and permitted independent control of both. This resulted in the generation of stable, quasimonoenergetic electron beams with central energy tunable in 50--300 MeV range. For the first time, we are able to independently control the beam charge and energy spread over the entire tunability range.
Obtaining muon beams with high density in 6D phase space is essential for realization of muon colliders, neutrino factories based on accelerated muons beams and other experiments involving muons. While several schemes to compress the beam phase space by means of muon cooling have been proposed, very little is known about the impact of particle-particle interactions in the whole design. In this paper, we examine the influence of space-charge fields on the cooling process of muon beams. We show that the cooling efficiency decreases with the degree of intensity, leading to emittance growth and particle loss for beams with large intensities. We further show that the emittance growth is only longitudinal and present a space-charge compensation solution by means of increasing the rf gradient. With the aid of numerical simulations, we obtain a quantitative relationship between the required compensation gradient and bunch charge and compare our results to earlier theoretical findings.
Optical transition radiation (OTR) has become a commonly used method for 2D beam imaging measurements. In the Accelerator Test Facility 2 (ATF2) at KEK, beam sizes smaller than the OTR point spread function have been measured. Simulations of the OTR imaging system have been performed using the ZEMAX software to study the effects of optical errors such as aberrations, diffraction, and misalignments of optical components. This paper presents a comparison of simulations of the OTR point spread function with experimental data obtained at ATF2. It shows how the quantification and control of optical errors impacts on optimizing the resolution of the system. We also show that the OTR point spread function needs to be predicted accurately to optimize any optical system and to predict the error made on measurement.
Full exploitation of emittance exchange (EEX) requires aberration-free performance of a complex imaging system including active radio-frequency (rf) elements which can add temporal distortions. We investigate the performance of an EEX line where the exchange occurs between two dimensions with normalized emittances which differ by multiple orders of magnitude. The transverse emittance is exchanged into the longitudinal dimension using a double dogleg emittance exchange setup with a five cell rf deflector cavity. Aberration correction is performed on the four most dominant aberrations. These include temporal aberrations that are corrected with higher order magnetic optical elements located where longitudinal and transverse emittance are coupled. We demonstrate aberration-free performance of an EEX line with emittances differing by four orders of magnitude, i.e., an initial transverse emittance of 1 pm-rad is exchanged with a longitudinal emittance of 10 nm-rad.
In this paper, we discuss the velocity compression in a short rf linac of an electron bunch from a rf photoinjector operated in the blowout regime. Particle tracking simulations shows that with a beam charge of 2 pC an ultrashort bunch duration of 16 fs can be obtained at a tight longitudinal focus downstream of the linac. A simplified coherent transition radiation (CTR) spectrum method is developed to enable the measurement of ultrashort (sub-50 fs) bunches at low bunch energy (5 MeV) and low bunch charges (<10 pC). In this method, the ratio of the radiation energy selected by two narrow bandwidth filters is used to estimate the bunch length. The contribution to the coherent form factor of the large transverse size of the bunch suppresses the radiation signal significantly and is included in the analysis. The experiment was performed at the UCLA Pegasus photoinjector laboratory. The measurement results show bunches of sub-40 fs with 2 pC of charge well consistent with the simulation using actual experimental conditions. These results open the way to the generation of ultrashort bunches with time-duration below 10 fs once some of the limitations of the setup (rf phase jitter, amplitude instability and low field in the gun limited by breakdown) are corrected.
The roughness of a photocathode could lead to an additional uncorrelated divergence of the emitted electrons and therefore to an increased thermal emittance. To calculate the emittance growth due to the cathode roughness, people usually choose a simple 2D sinusoidal surface model to avoid mathematical complexity. In this paper, we demonstrate an analytical method, which is inspired by the point spread function that has been widely used in radiation imaging field, to accurately evaluate the emittance growth due to the random roughness of a real-life cathode. Both analytical and numerical studies are performed. Our analytical formulas clearly reveal the relationship between the surface roughness and the emittance growth. Both analytical and numerical results surprisingly show that in the typical 3D random surface case, the influence of the surface roughness on the emittance growth is much smaller than the 2D sinusoidal case with typical roughness properties, however with roughness properties which are matched to the 3D case, the emittance growth conditions in these two cases are very similar. Even with applied electric field strength up to 120 MV/m, the total emittance growth is still below 10%. It implies that the large emittance growth (50%-100%) observed on metallic cathodes in some experiments, which is generally believed to be the result of the electric field on the rough surface, might be due to some other reasons.
Two closely spaced electron bunches have attracted strong interest due to their applications in two color X-ray free-electron lasers as well as witness bunch acceleration in plasmas and dielectric structures. In this paper, we propose a new scheme of delay system to vary the time delay up to several picoseconds while not affecting the bunch compression. Numerical simulations based on the Linac Coherent Light Source are performed to demonstrate the feasibility of this method.
We discuss the progress in the R&D program for a future upgrade of the European XFEL facility, namely for an operation in the continuous wave (cw) and long pulse (lp) modes, which will allow for significantly more flexibility in the electron and photon beam time structure. Results of cw/lp runs with preseries XFEL cryomodules and status of components needed for the new operation modes are presented here.
A charge sheet model is proposed to study the space charge effect and uniformity of charge separation of an electron pulse train in a drift space. An analytical formula is derived for the charge density limit as a function of gap spacing, injecting energy and pulse separation. To consider the relativistic effects, the theoretical results are verified by numerical solutions up to 80 MeV. This model can be applied to the design of Smith-Purcell radiation, multiple-pulse electron beam for time resolved electron microscopy, and to free electron laser.
A significant part of the experimental program at Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) is dedicated to pbar physics requiring a high number of cooled pbars per hour. The primary proton beam has to be provided by a 70 MeV proton linac followed by two synchrotrons. The new FAIR proton linac will deliver a pulsed proton beam of up to 35 mA of 36 mu s duration at a repetition rate of 4 Hz (maximum). The GSI heavy ion linac (UNILAC) is able to deliver world record uranium beam intensities for injection into the synchrotrons, but it is not suitable for FAIR relevant proton beam operation. In an advanced machine investigation program it could be shown that the UNILAC is able to provide for sufficient high intensities of CH 3 beam, cracked (and stripped) in a supersonic nitrogen gas jet into protons and carbon ions. This advanced operational approach will result in up to 3 mA of proton intensity at a maximum beam energy of 20 MeV, 100 mu s pulse duration and a repetition rate of up to 2.7 Hz delivered to the synchrotron SIS18. Recent linac beam measurements will be presented, showing that the UNILAC is able to serve as a proton FAIR injector for the first time, while the performance is limited to 25% of the FAIR requirements.
