U.S. Particle Accelerator School
U.S. Particle Accelerator School
America's National School of Accelerator Science and Technology

High Gradient RF Structures

Sponsoring University:

Old Dominion University

Course Name:

High Gradient RF Structures

Instructors:

Sami Tantawi, Stanford University and SLAC National Accelerator Lab; Evgenya Simakov, Los Alamos National Lab

Purpose and Audience
The purpose of this course is to introduce the students to the physics and technology of high gradient accelerator structures and their applications in future light sources, high energy physics machines, medical system, and industry.  Design methodologies and criteria for each of these applications will be discussed. The students will get a review of manufacturing techniques and particular aspects of building and commissioning these structures.   This course is suitable for graduate students considering accelerator physics as a possible career.  

Prerequisites
An advanced (graduate) or an intermediate course in electrodynamics or equivalent.

It is the responsibility of the student to ensure that they meet the course prerequisites or have equivalent experience.

Objectives
At the end of this course student should be able to understand the multifaceted design problem of ultra-high gradient accelerator structures. Students will become familiar with the design tools, their principles, and be able to apply them to successfully design the accelerator structure for a given application. In addition, the principles of the electromagnetic design and wakefields analysis taught in this class are applicable not only to high gradient accelerators but also to a wide range of electromagnetic and general accelerator applications.

Instructional Method
This course includes a series of lectures during morning sessions, followed by the afternoon simulation laboratory and exercise sessions.  The simulation laboratory will familiarize the students with hands-on exploration design tools for radio-frequency cavities optimizations, and particle wave interactions. Students will go through a number of exercises in electrodynamics and beam physics. Problem sets will be assigned to be completed outside of scheduled class sessions. Two instructors will be available at all times.

Course Content

  1. Introduction: linear accelerator design
    - Periodic structures;
    - Equivalent circuit and scattering matrix representations.
  2. Maxwell’s equations and their application to design of accelerator structures. RF simulation tools.
  3. High gradient breakdown phenomena in vacuum RF structures: empirical and statistical analysis.
  4. Design of high gradient linac structures.
  5. Formalism of wakefields:
    - Longitudinal wakes, energy spread and mitigations and wakes’ effect on gradients;
    - Transverse wakes, BNS damping, and alignment tolerances.
  6. Detuned structures for wakefield mitigations.
  7. Damped structures and introduction to photonic bandgap structures.


Reading Requirements
Reading materials will be provided by instructors.

Credit Requirements
Students will be evaluated based on their performance in: final exam (approx. 30% of final grade), homework assignments (approx. 35% of final grade), and computer/lab sessions (approx. 35% of final grade).


Old Dominion University course number: Phys 696, "Special Topics in Accelerator Physics"
Indiana University course number: Physics 671, "Advanced Topics in Accelerator Physics"
Michigan State University course number: PHY 963, "U.S. Particle Accelerator School"
MIT course number: 8.790, "Accelerator Physics"