High-Gradient Two-Beam Electron Accelerator

In a two-beam accelerator, a high current drive beam imparts energy to a low current test beam by generating microwave power that flows from one beam to the other. The largest project of this sort is CLIC, located at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland, that is being designed for operation at an electron-positron center-of-mass energy as high as 3 TeV. Technical complexity and low efficiency characterize plans for this project, are create technical hurdles that present serious challenges for its designers. This project proposes a new approach to two-beam acceleration by employing detuned cavities in its accelerator structure. In this way, it is possible for both the drive and test beams to traverse the same cavity. This could allow operation at higher acceleration gradients than CLIC because of the possibility of exciting the cavities in more than one mode simultaneously, and could allow a higher efficiency for power transfer between one beam and the other. Commercial applications and other benefits: For construction of a future multi-TeV electron-positron collider, costs will scale down as the working acceleration gradient rises and as the complexity of the device falls. Thus one benefit from use of the proposed cavity structure could be a drop in the cost for the machine. This could