Emittance preservation in advanced accelerators

Emittance is a beam quality that is vital for many future applications of advanced accelerators, such as compact free-electron lasers and linear colliders. In this paper, we review the challenges of preserving the transverse emittance during acceleration, both inside and outside accelerator stages. Sources of emittance growth range from space charge and instabilities caused by transverse wakefields, which can occur in any advanced accelerator scheme regardless of medium or driver type, to sources more specific to plasma accelerators, such as mismatching, misalignment, ion motion, Coulomb scattering, chromaticity between stages, and more

Emittance preservation in advanced accelerators

Emittance is a beam quality that is vital for many future applications of advanced accelerators, such as compact free-electron lasers and linear colliders. In this paper, we review the challenges of preserving the transverse emittance during acceleration, both inside and outside accelerator stages. Sources of emittance growth range from space charge and instabilities caused by transverse wakefields, which can occur in any advanced accelerator scheme regardless of medium or driver type, to sources more specific to plasma accelerators, such as mismatching, misalignment, ion motion, Coulomb scattering, chromaticity between stages, and more.Comment: 23 pages, 14 figures, prepared for ICFA Beam Dynamics Newsletter 8

The CLEAR user facility at CERN

The conversion of the CALIFES beamline of CTF3 into the ‘‘CERN Linear Electron Accelerator for Research’’ (CLEAR) facility was approved in December 2016. The primary focus for CLEAR is general accelerator R&D and component studies for existing and possible future accelerator applications. This includes studies for high gradient acceleration methods, e.g. for CLIC and plasma technology, and prototyping and validation of accelerator components, e.g. for the HL-LHC upgrade. The facility also provides irradiation test capabilities for characterisation of electronic components and for medical applications. A description of the facility with details on the achievable beam parameters, and the status and plans are presented

Emittance Preservation in an Aberration-Free Active Plasma Lens

Active plasma lensing is a compact technology for strong focusing of charged particle beams, which has gained considerable interest for use in novel accelerator schemes. While providing kT=m focusing gradients, active plasma lenses can have aberrations caused by a radially nonuniform plasma temperature profile, leading to degradation of the beam quality. We present the first direct measurement of this aberration, consistent with theory, and show that it can be fully suppressed by changing from a light gas species (helium) to a heavier gas species (argon). Based on this result, we demonstrate emittance preservation for an electron beam focused by an argon-filled active plasma lens

Long-range attraction of an ultrarelativistic electron beam by a column of neutral plasma

We report on the experimental observation of the attraction of a beam of ultrarelativistic electrons towards a column of neutral plasma. In experiments performed at the FACET test facility at SLAC we observe that an electron beam moving parallel to a neutral plasma column, at an initial distance of many plasma column radii, is attracted into the column. Once the beam enters the plasma it drives a plasma wake similar to that of an electron beam entering the plasma column head-on. A simple analytical model is developed in order to capture the essential physics of the attractive force. The attraction is further studied by 3D particle-in-cell numerical simulations. The results are an important step towards better understanding of particle beam–plasma interactions in general and plasma wakefield accelerator technology in particular

Measurement of Transverse Wakefields Induced by a Misaligned Positron Bunch in a Hollow Channel Plasma Accelerator

Hollow channel plasma wakefield acceleration is a proposed method to provide high acceleration gradients for electrons and positrons alike: a key to future lepton colliders. However, beams which are misaligned from the channel axis induce strong transverse wakefields, deflecting beams and reducing the collider luminosity. This undesirable consequence sets a tight constraint on the alignment accuracy of the beam propagating through the channel. Direct measurements of beam misalignment-induced transverse wakefields are therefore essential for designing mitigation strategies. We present the first quantitative measurements of transverse wakefields in a hollow plasma channel, induced by an off-axis 20 GeV positron bunch, and measured with another 20 GeV lower charge trailing positron probe bunch. The measurements are largely consistent with theory

FIRST MEASUREMENTS OF TROJAN HORSE INJECTION IN A PLASMA WAKEFIELD ACCELERATOR

Plasma accelerators support accelerating fields of 10-100’s of GV/m over meter-scale distances and routinely produce femtosecond-scale, multi-kA electron bunches. The so called Trojan Horse underdense photocathode plasma wakefield acceleration scheme combines state of-the-art accelerator technology with laser and plasma methods and paves the way to improve beam quality as regards emittance and energy spread by many orders of magnitude. Electron beam brightness levels exceeding 10^20 A m^-2 rad^-2 may be reached, and the tunability allows for multi-GeV energies, designer bunches and energy spreads <0.05% in a single plasma accelerator stage. The talk will present results of the international E210 multiyear experimental program at SLAC FACET, which culminated in successful first demonstration of the Trojan Horse method during FACET’s final experimental run in 2016. Enabling implications for applications, including high performance plasma-based 5th generation light sources such as hard x-ray FEL’s, for which preliminary start-to-end simulations are presented, and for high energy physics are discussed

FIRST MEASUREMENTS OF TROJAN HORSE INJECTION IN A PLASMA WAKEFIELD ACCELERATOR

Plasma accelerators support accelerating fields of 10-100’s of GV/m over meter-scale distances and routinely produce femtosecond-scale, multi-kA electron bunches. The so called Trojan Horse underdense photocathode plasma wakefield acceleration scheme combines state of-the-art accelerator technology with laser and plasma methods and paves the way to improve beam quality as regards emittance and energy spread by many orders of magnitude. Electron beam brightness levels exceeding 10^20 A m^-2 rad^-2 may be reached, and the tunability allows for multi-GeV energies, designer bunches and energy spreads <0.05% in a single plasma accelerator stage. The talk will present results of the international E210 multiyear experimental program at SLAC FACET, which culminated in successful first demonstration of the Trojan Horse method during FACET’s final experimental run in 2016. Enabling implications for applications, including high performance plasma-based 5th generation light sources such as hard x-ray FEL’s, for which preliminary start-to-end simulations are presented, and for high energy physics are discussed