Transverse phase space characterisation in the CLARA FE accelerator test facility at Daresbury Laboratory

TL;DR

This paper compares three techniques for characterising the transverse phase space of a beam in a linear accelerator, demonstrating that phase space tomography provides the most reliable insights into structured beam distributions.

Contribution

It introduces the first experimental results of four-dimensional phase space tomography in the CLARA FE accelerator, highlighting its advantages over traditional methods.

Findings

Tomography is most reliable for structured beam distributions.

First experimental 4D phase space tomography results.

Technique provides insights for machine optimization.

Abstract

We compare three techniques for characterising the transverse phase space distribution of the beam in CLARA FE (the Compact Linear Accelerator for Research and Applications Front End, at Daresbury Laboratory, UK): emittance and optics measurements using screens at three separate beamline locations; quadrupole scans; and phase space tomography. We find that where the beam distribution has significant structure (as in the case of CLARA FE at the time the measurements presented here were made) tomography analysis is the most reliable way to obtain a meaningful characterisation of the transverse beam properties. We present the first experimental results from four-dimensional phase space tomography: our results show that this technique can provide an insight into beam properties that are of importance for optimising machine performance.