Beam emittance growth due to the strong space-charge field at low energy of a high-intensity ion linac and its mitigation using an octupole magnetic field

Chimura, Motoki ; Harada, Hiroyuki  ; Kinsho, Michikazu  

In the low-energy region of a high-intensity ion linac, a strong space-charge field causes a rapid beam emittance growth over a short distance of only few meters. The beam emittance growth leads to a beam loss and the machine activation raising a serious issue for regular maintenance of the accelerator component and beam power ramp up. In this work, we studied the mechanism of beam emittance growth due to the space-charge field based on three-dimensional particle-tracking simulation and theoretical considerations. Numerical simulations done for the high-intensity linac at J-PARC shows that the nonlinear terms in the space-charge field directly cause a beam emittance growth and beam halo formation. Then, we also propose a method to mitigate the beam emittance growth by using an octupole magnetic field, which arises as one of the nonlinear terms in the space-charge field. By applying this method in the simulation, we have succeeded mitigating the beam emittance growth.