High quality electron beam generation in a proton-driven hollow plasma wakefield accelerator

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that using a hollow plasma channel in proton-driven wakefield accelerators enables high-quality, high-charge electron acceleration to TeV energies, potentially advancing future plasma-based colliders.

Contribution

The study introduces a novel hollow plasma channel approach that improves electron beam quality and charge in proton-driven wakefield acceleration.

Findings

Electrons are accelerated to 0.6 TeV in a 700 m channel.

Electron beam maintains normalized emittance during acceleration.

High charge electron bunches (~10% of proton charge) are achieved.

Abstract

Simulations of proton-driven plasma wakefield accelerators have demonstrated substantially higher accelerating gradients compared to conventional accelerators and the viability of accelerating electrons to the energy frontier in a single plasma stage. However, due to the strong intrinsic transverse fields varying both radially and in time, the witness beam quality is still far from suitable for practical application in future colliders. Here we demonstrate efficient acceleration of electrons in proton-driven wakefields in a hollow plasma channel. In this regime, the witness bunch is positioned in the region with a strong accelerating field, free from plasma electrons and ions. We show that the electron beam carrying the charge of about 10% of 1 TeV proton driver charge can be accelerated to 0.6 TeV with preserved normalized emittance in a single channel of 700 m. This high quality and high charge beam may pave the way for the development of future plasma-based energy frontier colliders.