[en] The advent of short electron bunches in high brightness linear accelerators has raised the awareness of the accelerator community to the degradation of the beam transverse emittance by coherent synchrotron radiation (CSR) emitted in magnetic bunch length compressors, transfer lines and turnaround arcs. Beam optics control has been proposed to mitigate that CSR effect. In this article, we enlarge on the existing literature by reviewing the validity of the linear optics approach in a periodic, achromatic arc compressor. We then study the dependence of the CSR-perturbed emittance to beam optics, mean energy, and bunch charge. The analytical findings are compared with particle tracking results. Practical considerations on CSR-induced energy loss and nonlinear particle dynamics are included. As a result, we identify the range of parameters that allows feasibility of an arc compressor for driving, for example, a free electron laser or a linear collider.

[en] Linear accelerators delivering high brightness electron beams are essential for a number of current and proposed accelerator applications, such as free electron lasers (FELs). In this kind of facilities the charge density is high enough to drive collective effects (wakefields) that, notwithstanding the high beam rigidity at energies up to the GeV range, may increase the beam emittance relative to the injection level, eventually degrading the nominal beam brightness. New theoretical developments and experimental capabilities, driven by the recent construction of vacuum-ultra-violet and X-ray linac-driven FELs, have advanced the present knowledge. This article describes the progress in the field of ultra-relativistic electron beam manipulation to maximize the final beam brightness, with a focus on the most recent techniques including optics design, pulse shaping and brightness optimization strategies. The theoretical models are supported by a review of the experimental results in now-running FEL facilities

[en] Optics matching and transverse emittance preservation are key goals for a successful operation of modern high brightness electron linacs. The capability of controlling them in a real machine critically relies on a properly designed magnetic lattice. Conscious of this fact, we introduce an ensemble of optical functions that permit to solve the often neglected conflict between strong focusing, typically implemented to counteract coherent synchrotron radiation and transverse wakefield instability, and distortion of the transverse phase space induced by chromatic aberrations and focusing errors. A numerical evaluation of merit functions is applied to existing and planned linac-based free electron lasers

[en] CBP-Tech Note-345 (July 2005), devoted to a study of microbunching instability in FERMIatELETTRA linac quotes '...the above analysis shows that the most of the gain in microbunching instability occurs after BC2, i.e. after transformation of the energy modulation to the spatial modulation that takes place in BC2. It is possible to avoid that if we use only BC1 for all our needs for bunch compression. There are also additional advantages for a mitigation of the microbunching instability related to that. First, we would need to increase R56 in BC1 (for given energy chirp in the electron beam). Second, a relative energy spread is significantly larger at BC1 than at BC2. Both these factors would contribute to instability suppression due to increased Landau damping effect.' One additional argument was however missed in that report. Instability smearing due to finite emittance is stronger in BC1 simply because the geometrical emittance is larger than in BC2. In spite of the considerations in favor of a lattice with one-stage compressor, it was thought at the time that the two bunch compressors configuration was still preferable as it appeared difficult to obtain a flat-flat distribution at the end of the linac with only one bunch compressor. A flat-flat distribution has constant medium energy and a constant peak current along the electron bunch. Now, two years later and more studies behind, this problem is solvable. It has been demonstrated1 that shaping the intensity of the electron bunch at the injector using intensity modulation of the photocathode laser allows to use the linac structural wake fields to advantage to obtain a flat-flat distribution at the end of the linac in a two-stage compressor. This report shows that, using the back-tracking technique, it is possible to obtain a flat-flat distribution also in a single-stage compressor. Preliminary results of a study of the microbunching instability applied to the FERMI lattice with one-stage compressor are shown in this report . There is concern that the effect of jitter in accelerator parameters is more pronounced with one bunch compressor: the results of jitter studies are given and are compared with the case of a two-stage compressor

[en] In this note we describe a conceptual design of a part of the electron beam delivery system for FERMI(at)Elettra free electron laser(FEL) located between the end of the linac and the entrance to the FEL. This part includes the emittance diagnostic section, the electron beam switchyard for two FELs called spreader and matching sections. The design meets various constrains imposed by the existing and planned building boundaries, desire for utilization of existing equipment and demands for various diagnostic instruments

[en] Bunch length magnetic compression is used in high-brightness linacs driving free-electron lasers (FELs) and particle colliders to increase the peak current of the injected beam. To date, it is performed in dedicated insertions made of few degrees bending magnets and the compression factor is limited by the degradation of the beam transverse emittance owing to emission of coherent synchrotron radiation (CSR). We reformulate the known concept of CSR-driven optics balance for the general case of varying bunch length and demonstrate, through analytical and numerical results, that a 500 pC charge beam can be time-compressed in a periodic 180 deg arc at 2.4 GeV beam energy and lower, by a factor of up to 45, reaching peak currents of up to 2 kA and with a normalized emittance growth at the $0.1\mathrm{\mu <!--\; ??\; -->}\text{m}$ rad level. The proposed solution offers new schemes of beam longitudinal gymnastics; an application to an energy recovery linac driving FEL is discussed. (letter)

[en] This chapter describes the accelerator physics aspects, the engineering considerations and the choice of parameters that led to the accelerator design of the FERMI Free-Electron-Laser. The accelerator (also called the ''electron beam delivery system'') covers the region from the exit of the injector to the entrance of the first FEL undulator. The considerations that led to the proposed configuration were made on the basis of a study that explored various options and performance limits. This work follows previous studies of x-ray FEL facilities (SLAC LCLS [1], DESY XFEL [2], PAL XFEL [3], MIT [4], BESSY FEL [5], LBNL LUX [6], Daresbury 4GLS [7]) and integrates many of the ideas that were developed there. Several issues specific to harmonic cascade FELs, and that had not yet been comprehensively studied, were also encountered and tackled. A particularly difficult issue was the need to meet the requirement for high peak current and small slice energy spread, as the specification for the ratio of these two parameters (that defines the peak brightness of the electron beam) is almost a factor of two higher than that of the LCLS's SASE FEL. Another challenging aspect was the demand to produce an electron beam with as uniform as possible peak current and energy distributions along the bunch, a condition that was met by introducing novel beam dynamics techniques. Part of the challenge was due to the fact that there were no readily available computational tools to carry out reliable calculations, and these had to be developed. Most of the information reported in this study is available in the form of scientific publications, and is partly reproduced here for the convenience of the reader

[en] The purpose of a laser heater is to increase the electron beam uncorrelated energy spread as a way to control and ideally suppress the microbunching instability in the linac drive for x-rays FELs. We review the motivations for equipping FERMI with a laser heater and provide a specification for the basics parameters as well as a description of a practical layout including desired diagnostics provisions for both the electron and laser beams. We also outline some useful operational guidelines for commissioning

[en] Design studies are in progress to use the existing FERMI(at)Elettra linear accelerator for a seeded harmonic cascade free-electron laser (FEL) facility [1]. This accelerator will be upgraded to 1.2 GeV and equipped with a low-emittance RF photocathode gun, laser heater, two bunch compressors, and a beam delivery system. We present an optimization study of all the components downstream of the gun, aimed at achieving the high peak current, low energy spread and low emittance electron beam necessary for the FEL. Various operational scenarios are discussed. Results of accelerator simulations including effects of space charge, coherent synchrotron radiation and wakefields are reported

[en] A study of the electron beam dynamics in the linac is conducted for the FERMI free electron laser (FEL) founded for construction at the Sincrotrone Trieste