AWAKE: a proton-driven plasma wakefield acceleration experiment at CERN

AWAKE：欧洲核子研究中心的质子驱动等离子体尾场加速实验

• 批准号: ST/N001613/1
• 负责人: Matthew Wing
• 金额: $ 22.84万
• 依托单位: University College London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2016
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2016 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=ST%2FN001613%2F1
• 关键词: AWAKE; proton; driven; plasma; wakefield

Over the last fifty years, accelerators of ever increasing energy and size have allowed us to probe the fundamental structure of the physical world. This has culminated in the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, Geneva, a 27-km long accelerator which has discovered the Higgs Boson and is about to embark on searches for new phenomena such as Supersymmetry. Using current accelerator technology, future high energy colliders will be of similar length or even longer. As an alternative, we are pursuing a new technology which would allow a reduction by about a factor of ten in length and hence would be expected to reduce the cost by a significant fraction. The idea presented here is to impact a high-energy proton beam, such as those at CERN, into a plasma. The free, negatively-charged electrons in the plasma are knocked out of their position by the protons, but are then attracted back by the positively-charged ions, creating a high-gradient electric "wakefield" and an oscillating motion is started by the plasma electrons. Experiments have already been carried out impacting lasers or an electron beam onto a plasma and accelerating gradients have been observed which are 1000 times higher than conventional accelerators. Given the much higher initial energy of available proton beams, it is anticipated that the electric fields it creates in a plasma could accelerate electrons in the wakefield up to the teraelectron-volts scale required for a future collider, but in a single stage and with a length of a few km. Such a collider is, however, many years in the future and test experiments are first needed.The AWAKE collaboration will perform a first proof-of-principle experiment at CERN. The experiment will use a high-energy proton beam to impact on a plasma cell of about 10 m and measure the energy change in a bunch of electrons which will travel behind the proton beam. Observing significant energy changes in the electrons would demonstrate the concept of this form of acceleration which has so far only been studied in simulation.The UK has several groups (Central Laser Facilities, Cockcroft Institute, Imperial College, John Adams Institute, Strathclyde and UCL) in the collaboration preparing the AWAKE experiment in CERN. We propose a programme to develop a wide-range of instrumentation which will the allow us to successfully build the experiment and extract the physics necessary to demonstrate the power of this approach. A crucial part is being able to build a plasma cell with a uniform density over lengths much longer than previously tried. We will also deliver elements of the electron source to be fired into the plasma at exactly the right time so as to feel the largest possible accelerating gradient in the wakefield created by the proton beam. To determine the success of the experiment, we will measure the properties of the plasma and the energy and spatial profile of the electron beam after it has been accelerated in the plasma. Finally, our results will improve simulations of plasma wakefields to give us more confidence in our expectations of a larger-scale experiment and help us best optimise its layout and capabilities. If successful, this experiment will lead to a further larger-scale project to accelerate bunches of electrons of small spatial extent with high particle numbers and ultimately a new form of acceleration which could lead to future, energy-frontier particle physics experiments. This technique has the potential to radically alter the frontier of high energy physics with accelerators as performant as currently planned or required, but at a tenth of the length and hence cost. With the significantly larger acceleration gradients and smaller spatial extent, plasma-based accelerator technology could also lead to vastly smaller synchrotron light sources which probe the structure of e.g. proteins and table-top accelerators of lower energy for use in hospitals or industry.

在过去的五十年中，能量和规模不断增加的加速器使我们能够探究物理世界的基本结构。这已经达到了Geneva Cern的大型强子对撞机，这是一个27公里长的加速器，它发现了Higgs玻色子，即将开始搜索诸如超对称性之类的新现象。使用当前的加速器技术，未来的高能量攻针的长度甚至更长。作为替代方案，我们正在追求一项新技术，该技术将使长度减少约10倍，因此有望将成本降低，只有很大一部分。这里提出的想法是将高能质子束（例如Cern的高能质子束）变成等离子体。等离子体中的免费，负电荷的电子被质子从其位置撞倒，但随后被带正电荷的离子吸引了，产生了高梯度的电气“韦克菲尔德”，并且血浆电子启动了振荡运动。已经对激光器或电子束进行了实验，已经观察到比传统加速器高1000倍的加速梯度。鉴于可用质子梁的初始能量要高得多，预计它在血浆中产生的电场可以在韦克菲尔德中加速电子，直到将来的对撞机所需的teraelectron-volts量表，但要在一个单个阶段，但在一个阶段，并且长度为几km。但是，这样的对撞机将在未来很多年，首先需要进行测试实验。醒来的合作将在CERN进行首个原理实验。该实验将使用高能质子束对大约10 m的浆细胞撞击，并测量一堆电子将在质子束后传播的电子变化。观察电子的重大变化将证明这种加速形式的概念，该加速度迄今仅在模拟中进行了研究。我们提出了一个计划，以开发大量的仪器，这将使我们能够成功地构建实验并提取必要的物理学来证明这种方法的力量。关键部分是能够构建一个均匀密度的等离子电池，其长度比以前尝试过的时间长得多。我们还将在正确的时间传递电子源的元素，以便在适当的时间发射到等离子体中，以感受到质子束创建的韦克菲尔德中最大的加速梯度。为了确定实验的成功，我们将测量等离子体在等离子体中加速的电子束的能量和空间谱。最后，我们的结果将改善对等离子体Wakefields的模拟，以使我们对我们对大型实验的期望更有信心，并帮助我们最好地优化其布局和功能。如果成功的话，该实验将导致一个大规模的项目，以高颗粒数加速较小的空间范围的电子束，并最终是一种新的加速形式，这可能导致未来的能量范围粒子粒子物理实验。该技术有可能以当前计划或要求的性能从根本上改变高能物理的前沿，但以长度的十分之一，因此成本。随着较大的加速度梯度和较小的空间范围，基于等离子体的加速器技术也可能导致较小的同步加速器光源，从而探测例如用于医院或行业的蛋白质和桌面加速器。

项目成果

An electron spectrometer for proton driven plasma accelerated electrons at AWAKE: Predicted resolution of energy and emittance measurements

用于质子驱动等离子体加速电子的电子能谱仪 AWAKE：能量和发射率测量的预测分辨率

• DOI: 10.1109/nssmic.2016.8069746
• 发表时间: 2016
• 作者: Deacon L

VHEeP: a very high energy electron-proton collider

• DOI: 10.1140/epjc/s10052-016-4316-1
• 发表时间: 2016-08-17
• 期刊: EUROPEAN PHYSICAL JOURNAL C
• 影响因子: 4.4
• 作者: Caldwell, A.;Wing, M.
• 通讯作者: Wing, M.

AWAKE, The Advanced Proton Driven Plasma Wakefield Acceleration Experiment at CERN

• DOI: 10.1016/j.nima.2016.02.026
• 发表时间: 2016-09-01
• 期刊: NUCLEAR INSTRUMENTS & METHODS IN PHYSICS RESEARCH SECTION A-ACCELERATORS SPECTROMETERS DETECTORS AND ASSOCIATED EQUIPMENT
• 影响因子: 1.4
• 作者: Gschwendtner, E.;Adli, E.;Zhang, H.
• 通讯作者: Zhang, H.

Acceleration of electrons in the plasma wakefield of a proton bunch.

• DOI: 10.1038/s41586-018-0485-4
• 发表时间: 2018-09
• 期刊: Nature
• 影响因子: 64.8
• 作者: Adli E;Ahuja A;Apsimon O;Apsimon R;Bachmann AM;Barrientos D;Batsch F;Bauche J;Berglyd Olsen VK;Bernardini M;Bohl T;Bracco C;Braunmüller F;Burt G;Buttenschön B;Caldwell A;Cascella M;Chappell J;Chevallay E;Chung M;Cooke D;Damerau H;Deacon L;Deubner LH;Dexter A;Doebert S;Farmer J;Fedosseev VN;Fiorito R;Fonseca RA;Friebel F;Garolfi L;Gessner S;Gorgisyan I;Gorn AA;Granados E;Grulke O;Gschwendtner E;Hansen J;Helm A;Henderson JR;Hüther M;Ibison M;Jensen L;Jolly S;Keeble F;Kim SY;Kraus F;Li Y;Liu S;Lopes N;Lotov KV;Maricalva Brun L;Martyanov M;Mazzoni S;Medina Godoy D;Minakov VA;Mitchell J;Molendijk JC;Moody JT;Moreira M;Muggli P;Öz E;Pasquino C;Pardons A;Peña Asmus F;Pepitone K;Perera A;Petrenko A;Pitman S;Pukhov A;Rey S;Rieger K;Ruhl H;Schmidt JS;Shalimova IA;Sherwood P;Silva LO;Soby L;Sosedkin AP;Speroni R;Spitsyn RI;Tuev PV;Turner M;Velotti F;Verra L;Verzilov VA;Vieira J;Welsch CP;Williamson B;Wing M;Woolley B;Xia G
• 通讯作者: Xia G

AWAKE: A Proton-Driven Plasma Wakefield Acceleration Experiment at CERN

AWAKE：欧洲核子研究组织的质子驱动等离子体韦克场加速实验

• DOI: 10.1016/j.nuclphysbps.2015.09.022
• 发表时间: 2016
• 期刊: Nuclear and Particle Physics Proceedings
• 作者: Bracco C