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abstract:
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We discuss future experimental work proposed to study the performance of a cylindrical dielectric wakefield accelerating structure as a coherent Cerenkov radiation source at the Neptune laboratory at UCLA. The Cerenkov wakefield acceleration experiment carried out recently by UCLA/SLAC/USC, using the ultrashort and high charge beam (Q = 3 nC, RMS bunch length = 20 micron) at the SLAC FFTB, demonstrated electromagnetic wakes at the few GV/m level. The motivation of our prospective experiment is to investigate the operation of a similar scenario using the comparatively long pulse, low charge beam (Q = 0.5 nC, RMS bunch length = 200 micron) at UCLA Neptune. The field amplitude produced in this setup would be one to two orders of magnitude lower, at the few tens to few 100 MV/m level. Such a decelerating field would extract a significant amount of energy from a low-energy beam in a distance on the order of a few centimeters, allowing the use of short dielectric structures. We discuss details of the geometry and composition of the structures to be used in the experiment. We also examine the possibility of a future dedicated facility at UCLA Neptune based on a hybrid photoinjector currently in development. The intrinsic bunch compression capabilities and improved beam parameters (RMS bunch length = 100 micron, Q = 1 nC) of the photoinjector would allow the creation of a high power radiation source in the terahertz regime.
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