Wuppertal 2015 – scientific programme

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AKBP: Arbeitskreis Beschleunigerphysik

AKBP 7: PWA / TNSA II

AKBP 7.5: Talk

Tuesday, March 10, 2015, 14:45–15:00, G.10.03 (HS 8)

Gas density measurement for self-modulation experiments at PITZ — •Gaurav Pathak¹ and Matthias Gross² — ¹Institut für Experimentalphysik, Universität Hamburg, Germany — ²Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron, Germany

Self-modulation (SM) of proton beams in a plasma has recently gained interest in the context of the PWFA experiment of the AWAKE collaboration which is in preparation at CERN. Instrumental for experiment is the SM of the proton beam via transverse wakefields in the plasma to generate bunchlets for resonant wave excitation and efficient acceleration. In turn, these generated wakefields dependent on the plasma density. A fundamental understanding of the underlying physics is vital, and hence an independent experiment has been set up at the beam line of the Photo Injector Test Facility at DESY, Zeuthen Site (PITZ), to study the SM of long electron beams in a plasma. This contribution presents experimental progress made for the gas density measurement, which later on, when subjected to an ArF laser radiation will create the required plasma. The Gas density measurement is crucial to optimize the beam and plasma parameters for the experiment. Knowledge of the gas density and hence the plasma density helps to deduce the key properties of the generated wakefields such as their magnitude and phase velocity, which both are of significant importance for the design of self-modulated plasma-based acceleration experiments.