Numerical study of a linear accelerator using laser-generated proton beams as a source

Abstract

The injection of laser-generated protons through conventional drift tube linear accelerators (linacs) has been studied numerically. For this, we used the parameters of the proton source produced by ultraintense lasers, i.e., with an intrinsic high beam quality. The numerical particle tracing code PARMELA [L. M. Young and J. H. Billen, LANL Report No. LA-UR-96-1835, 2004] is then used to inject experimentally measured laser-generated protons with energies of 7+-0.1 MeV and rms un-normalized emittance of 0.180 mm mrad into one drift tube linac tank that accelerated them to more than 14 MeV. The simulations exhibit un-normalized emittance growths of 8 in x direction and 22.6 in y direction, with final emittances lower than those produced using conventional sources, allowing a potential luminosity gain for the final beam. However, the simulations also exhibit a limitation in the allowed injected proton charge as, over 0.112 mA, space charge effect worsens significantly the beam emittance

Modeling target bulk heating resulting from ultra-intense short pulse laser irradiation of solid density targets

“…These high-energy, short-pulse, compact particle (or radiation) sources may be useful for a number of applications, ranging from inertial confinement fusion, 1-3 radiography of dense material, 4 generating compact particlemicro-lenses, 5 accelerator physics, 6,7 to the generation of warm dense matter (WDM) states. [8][9][10][11] Regarding the latter, the capability of laser-generated fast electrons to isochorically heat solid samples has been recently demonstrated.…”

Enhanced laser-driven proton acceleration using ultrasmall nanoparticles

“…Laser-driven proton acceleration, as obtained by the interaction of a high-intensity laser with a target, is a growing field of interest, in particular, for the different potential applications that are consolidating or emerging. These applications include their use in ultrafast radiography [1], novel fusion schemes [2], high-energy density matter [3], laboratory astrophysics [4], medical applications [5][6][7], novel neutron sources [8], cultural heritage [9,10], using them as injectors for larger accelerators [11,12], and material science [13][14][15][16]. Many of these applications build on the routine production of protons, where one of the main challenges is to optimize the proton energy and yield given specific laser parameters.…”

Enhanced proton acceleration in an applied longitudinal magnetic field

“…Laser-driven proton beams are already being successfully used to produce high energy density matter [1] and to radiograph transient processes [2]. They also hold a great promise for such diverse applications as fast ignition in the energy production scheme by inertial confinement fusion [3], tumor therapy [4,5], production of shortlived positron emitters for positron emission tomography [6,7], and the brightness increase in conventional accelerators [8,9]. However, in order to fully realize the potential of laser-driven proton and ion sources, a number of issues still remain to be addressed.…”