Beam Test Facility at SLAC

The Accelerator Directorate at SLAC recognizes a critical need for a dedicated beam test facility (BTF) to enable excellence of operation, bringing new technologies to maturity and providing the flexibility needed for cutting-edge R&D. The primary goal of this envisioned facility is to provide the platform for furthering SLAC’s core competencies in photocathode technology, high-brightness electron injectors, advanced beam physics and techniques including ML/AI, high-gradient acceleration technology and advanced acceleration concept programs. Moreover, the establishment of such a facility significantly bolsters our efforts in workforce retention and development.

We envision a phased approach to the realization of a BTF, utilizing existing SLAC infrastructure. The phased approach taken for two reasons – first, SLAC has a critical emergent need to test two injectors in the next two years – the spare gun for LCLS-II and the superconducting quarterwave that was built at MSU as part of the LCLS-II HE project. Second, the phased approach is taken to be more practical from a funding and staff availability perspective. Success in the gun testing will naturally lead to a desire to boost the beam, both to demonstrate the design gun emittance and to test novel acceleration structures (such as high gradient cooled copper). This will result in a facility that is immediately capable of making fundamental contributions to accelerator science, especially in the fields of novel acceleration, machine learning/accelerator controls, and cathode physics. This will naturally lead to a third phase, where the boosted beam from the SRF gun is available for a host of accelerator tests.

This talk will present the current thinking on the cost, timeline and capabilities of this proposed facility.