Emittance measurement & optimization for the photocathode RF gun with laser profile shaping

The Laser Undulator Compact X-ray source(LUCX) is a test bench for a compact high brightness X-ray generator,based on inverse Compton Scattering at KEK,which requires high intensity multi-bunch trains with low transverse emittance.A photocathode RF gun with emittance compensation solenoid is used as an electron source.Much endeavor has been made to increase the beam intensity in the multi-bunch trains.The cavity of the RF gun is tuned into an unbalanced field in order to reduce space charge effects,so that the field gradient on the cathode surface is relatively higher when the forward RF power into gun cavity is not high enough.A laser profile shaper is employed to convert the driving laser profile from Gaussian into uniform.In this research we seek to find the optimized operational conditions for the decrease of the transverse emittance.With the uniform driving laser and the unbalanced RF gun,the RMS transverse emittance of a 1 nC bunch has been improved effectively from 5.46 πmm.mrad to 3.66 πmm.mrad.     

First Beam Measurements of the S-Band photocathode Radio-Frequency Gun at Tsinghua University

During the last decades, photocathode rf gun has been proven to be successful in generating the high brightness electron beam （-lnC,-lπ mmmrad,-l ps） which is required by the ILC, XFEL, Thomson scattering x-ra y source, etc. A photocathode rf gun system is built to develop electron source for the Thomson scattering x-ray source at Accelerator Laboratory of Tsinghua University. The system consists of a BNL/ATF-type 1.6 cell S-band rf cavity, a solenoid for emittance compensation, a laser system and some simple equipments for beam diagnosis. The first beam measurements of the photocathode rf gun, including the dark current, transverse beam profile, charge and quantum efficiency, are reported.     

BXERL photo-injector based on a 217 MHz normal conducting RF gun

The Beijing X-ray Energy Recovery Linac (BXERL) test facility is proposed in Institute of High Physics (IHEP). In this proposal, the main linac requires the injector to provide an electron beam with 5 MeV energy and 10 mA average current. An injector based on DC gun technology is the first candidate electron source for BXERL. However, the field emission in the DC gun cavity makes it much more difficult to increase the high voltage to more than 500 kV. Another technology based on a 217 MHz normal conducting RF gun is proposed as the backup injector for this test facility. We have designed this RF gun with 2D SUPERFISH code and 3D MICROWAVE STUDIO code. In this paper, we present the optimized design of the gun cavity, the gun RF parameters and the set-up of the whole injector system. The detailed beam dynamics have been done and the simulation results show that the injector can generate electron bunches with RMS normalized emittance 1.0 uppi mmcdotmrad, bunch length 0.77 mm, beam energy 5.0 MeV and energy spread 0.60%.     

Beam tail effect of a performance-enhanced EC-ITC RF gun

The beam tail effect of multi-bunches will influence the electron beam performance in a high intensity thermionic RF gun. Beam dynamic calculations that illustrate the working states of single beam tail and multi-pulse feed-in of a performance-enhanced EC-ITC （external cathode independent tunable cavity） RF gun for an FEL （free electron laser） injector are performed to estimate the extracted bunch properties. By using both Parmela and homemade MATLAB codes, the effects of a single beam tail as well as interactions of multi-pulses are analyzed, where a ring-based electron algorithm is adopted to calculated RF fields and the space-charge field. Furthermore, the procedure of unexpected deviated-energy particles mixed with an effective bunch head is described by the MATLAB code as well. As a result, the performance-enhanced EC-ITC RF gun is proved to have the capability to extract continual stable bunches suitable for a high requirement THz-FEL.     

Simulation study of a photo-injector for brightness improvement in Thomson scattering X-ray source via ballistic bunching

Increasing the peak brightness is beneficial to various applications of the Thomson scattering X-ray source. A higher peak brightness of the scattered X-ray pulse demands a shorter scattering electron beam realized by beam compression in the electron beam-line. In this article, we study the possibility of compressing the electron beam in a typical S-band normal conducting photo-injector via ballistic bunching, through just adding a short RF linac section right behind the RF gun, so as to improve the peak brightness of the scattered x-ray pulse. Numerical optimization by ASTRA demonstrates that the peak current can increase from 50 A to > 300 A for a 500 pC, 10 ps FWHM electron pulse, while normalized transverse RMS emittance and RMS energy spread increases very little. Correspondingly, the peak brightness of the Thomson scattering X-ray source is estimated to increase about three times.     

RF deflecting cavity for bunch length measurement in Tsinghua Thomson scattering X-ray source

An RF deflecting cavity used for bunch length measurement has been designed and fabricated at Tsinghua University for the Thomson Scattering X-Ray Source. The cavity is a 2856 MHz, π-mode, 3-cell standing-wave cavity, to diagnose the 3.5 MeV beam produced by photocathode electron gun. With a larger power source, the same cavity will again be used to measure the accelerated beam with energy of 50~MeV before colliding with the laser pulse.     

RF deffecting cavity for bunch length measurement in Tsinghua Thomson scattering X-ray source

An RF deffecting cavity used for bunch length measurement has been designed and fabricated at Tsinghua University for the Thomson Scattering X-Ray Source. The cavity is a 2856 MHz, π-mode, 3-cell standing-wave cavity, to diagnose the 3.5 MeV beam produced by photocathode electron gun. With a larger power source, the same cavity will again be used to measure the accelerated beam with energy of 50 MeV before colliding with the laser pulse. The RF design using MAFIA for both the cavity shape and the power coupler is reviewed, followed by presenting the fabrication procedure and bench measurement results of two cavities.     

Generation and measurement of sub-picosecond electron bunch in photocathode rf gun

We consider a scheme to generate a sub-picosecond electron bunch in the photocathode rf gun by im-proving the acceleration gradient in the gun, suitably tuning the bunch charge, the laser spot size and the acceleration phase, and reducing the growth of transverse emittance by laser shaping. A nondestructive technique is also reported to measure the electron bunch length, by measuring the high-frequency spectrum of wakefield radiation which is caused by the passage of a relativistic electron bunch through a channel surrounded by a dielectric.     

A new method to generate relativistic comb bunches with tunable subpicosecond spacing

We propose and analyze a scheme to produce comb bunches, i.e. a bunch consisting of micro-bunch trains, with tunable subpicosecond spacing. In the scheme, the electron beam is first deflected by a deflecting cavity which introduces a longitudinal-dependent linear transverse kick to the particles. After passing through a drift space, the transverse beam size is linearly coupled to the longitudinal position of the particle inside the beam, and a mask is placed there to tailor the beam, then the mask distribution is imprinted on the beam's longitudinal distribution. A quadrupole magnet and another deflecting cavity are used in the beam line to compensate the transverse angle due to the first deflecting cavity. Analysis shows that the number, length, and spacing of the trains can be controlled through the parameters of the deflecting cavity and the mask. Such electron bunch trains can be applied to an infrared free electron laser, a plasma-wakefield accelerator and a supper-radiance THz source.     

TW Laser system for Thomson scattering X-ray light source at Tsinghua University

A TW (Tera Watt) laser system based on Ti:sapphire mainly for the Tsinghua Thomson scattering X-ray light source (TTX) is being built. Both UV (ultraviolet) laser pulse for driving the photocathode radiofrequency (RF) gun and the IR (infrared) laser pulse as the electron-beam-scattered-light are provided by the system. Efforts have also been made in laser pulse shaping and laser beam transport to optimize the high-brightness electron beam production by the photocathode RF gun.     

CSNS-II双谐波加速研究

The Rapid Cycling Synchrotron （RCS） of the China Spallation Neutron Source （CSNS） complex is designed to provide 1.56×10^13 protons per pulse （ppp） during the initial stage, and it is upgradeable to 3.12× 10^13 ppp during the second stage and 6.24× 10^13 ppp during the ultimate stage. The high beam intensity in the RCS requires alleviation of space charge effects to reduce beam losses, which is key in such high beam power accelerators. With higher intensities in the upgrading phases, a dual-harmonic RF system is planned to produce flat-topped bunches that are useful to reduce the space charge effects. We have studied different schemes to apply the dual-harmonic acceleration in CSNS-Ⅱ, and have calculated the main parameters of the RF svstems, which are presented in this Darter.     

Bunch length measurement at Tsinghua Thomson scattering X-ray source

The length of electron beam from a photocathode RF gun is determined by a spectrometer, according to the relative energy spread induced by the bunch length during the acceleration in a linac. For a photocathode RF gun, different laser injected phase and beam charge are studied. The compression is changed for the different laser phases, as from 10° to 30°, and the bunch length is lengthened due to the strong longitudinal space charge force, caused by the increased charge.     

Matching by solenoids in space charge dominated LEBTs

The betatron matching of a rotationally asymmetric beam in space charge dominated low-energy beam transports （LEBTs） where solenoids are used for the transverse matching has been studied. For better understanding, the coupling elements of a beam matrix are interpreted in special forms that are products of a term defined by the Larmor rotation angle and another by the difference between the beam matrix elements in the two transverse planes. The coupling form originally derived from the rotationally symmetric field in solenoids still holds when taking into account the rotationally asymmetric space charge forces that are due to the unequal emittance in the two transverse planes. It is shown in this paper that when an LEBT mainly comprising solenoids transports a beam having unequal emittance in the two transverse planes and the linear space charge force is taken into account, the initial Twiss parameters can be modified to obtain the minimum and equal emittance at the LEBT exit. The TRACE3D calculations also prove the principle. However, when quadrupoles that are also rotationally asymmetric are involved in between solenoids, the coupling between the two transverse planes becomes more complicated and the emittance increase is usually unavoidable. A matching example using the CSNS （China Spallation Neutron Source） LEBT conditions is also presented.     

PIC mode simulation of solenoid collimation channel

A new SSC （Separated Sector Cyclotron）-Linac is being designed to serve as an injector for the SSC at the HIRFL （Heavy Ion Research Facility Lanzhou）. The beam intensity at the LEBT （Low Energy Beam Transport） for the heavy ions after the selection is typically low and the space charge effects are inconspicuous. The space charge effects become obvious when the beam current increases to a few hundred microamperes. The emittance growth deriving from the space charge effects may be particularly troublesome for the following linac and cyclotron. An optical system containing three solenoids has been designed for the LEBT to limit the beam emittance and to avoid the unnecessary beam loss in the cyclotron, as well as for the purpose of immunizing the LEBT emittance growth due to the space charge effects. The results of the PIC （Particle- In-Cell） mode simulation illustrate that this channel could limit the beam emittance growth and increase the beam brightness.     

Analytical treatment of the nonlinear electron cloud effect and the combined effects with beam-beam and space charge nonlinear forces in storage rings

In this paper we treat first some nonlinear beam dynamics problems in storage rings, such as beam dynamic apertures due to magnetic multipoles, wiggles, beam-beam effects, nonlinear space charge effect, and then nonlinear electron cloud effect combined with beam-beam and space charge effects, analytically. This analytical treatment is applied to BEPC II. The corresponding analytical expressions developed in this paper are useful both in understanding the physics behind these problems and also in making practical quick hand estimations.     

Lie algebraic analysis and simulation of high-current pulsed beam transport in a solenoidal lens

Recent calculations of the transport of a high-current beam in a solenoidal lens have made progress to the second order with the Lie algebraic method. A review of the theory and our simulation to realize it will be described. Then we will present the results of simulation. A brief discussion on the space charge effect＇s contribution to the transportation will also be made.     

Bunch evolution study in optimization of Me V ultrafast electron diffraction

Megaelectronvolt ultrafast electron diffraction（UED） is a promising detection tool for ultrafast processes.The quality of diffraction image is determined by the transverse evolution of the probe bunch. In this paper, we study the contributing terms of the emittance and space charge effects to the bunch evolution in the MeV UED scheme, employing a mean-field model with an ellipsoidal distribution as well as particle tracking simulation. The small transverse dimension of the drive laser is found to be critical to improve the reciprocal resolution, exploiting both smaller emittance and larger transverse bunch size before the solenoid. The degradation of the reciprocal spatial resolution caused by the space charge effects should be carefully controlled.     

Compact narrow-band THz radiation source based on photocathode rf gun

Narrow-band THz coherent Cherenkov radiation can be driven by a subpicosecond electron bunch trav- eling along the axis of a hollow cylindrical dielectric-lined waveguide. We present a scheme of compact THz radiation source based on the photocathode rf gun. On the basis of our analytic result, the subpicosecond electron bunch with high charge （800 pC） can be generated directly in the photocathode rf gun. According to the analytical and simulated results, a narrow emission spectrum peaked at 0.24 THz with 2 megawatt （MW） peak power is expected to gain in the proposed scheme （the length of the facility is about 1.2 m）.     

Study on the effects of chromaticity and magnetic field tracking errors at CSNS/RCS

The Rapid Cycling Synchrotron （RCS） is a key component of the China Spallation Neutron Source （CSNS）. For this type of high intensity proton synchrotron, the chromaticity, space charge effects, and magnetic field tracking errors between the quadrupoles and the dipoles can induce beta function distortion and tune shift, and induce resonances. In this paper, the combined effects of chromaticity, magnetic field tracking errors and space charge on beam dynamics at CSNS/RCS are studied systemically. 3-D simulations with different magnetic field tracking errors are performed by using the code ORBIT, and the simulation results are compared with the case without tracking errors.