Beamstrahlung as an optics tuning tool at the SLC IP

Beamstrahlung radiation is discussed, with emphasis on its application to extracting the beam sizes from the observed signals and on monitoring the beam-beam collision in a nondisruptive manner. The calculations used include such effects as unequal beam sizes and aspect ratios, beam-beam offsets, and beam orientation. Techniques for finding the beam parameters for beams that are round or elliptical in the transverse plane are also discussed. The calculations are performed using assumptions which are justified under the operating conditions of the Stanford Linear Collider (SLC). It is concluded that beamstrahlung shows promise as a technique for monitoring the beam collisions at the SLC; but more work must be done to integrate fully the effects of the detector threshold and to understand the relationship between the beam parameters and the U₁ vs. ξ distribution shapes for elliptical beams