Study of Longitudinal Space-Charge Wave Dynamics in Space-Charge Dominated Beams

Understanding the dynamics of longitudinal space-charge waves is very important for advanced accelerator research. Although analytical solutions of space-charge wave equations based on the cold fluid model exist in one dimension, there are few results for two-dimensional wave evolution. One-dimensional theory predicts two eigen solutions, given an initial perturbation. One is called the fast wave, which moves toward the beam head in the beam frame and the other is termed the slow wave, which moves backward in the beam frame. In this paper, we report experimental results of space charge wave studies conducted on a 2.3 meter long straight beam line at the University of Maryland. An energy analyzer is used to directly measure the energy of space-charge waves at the end of the transport line, which demonstrates the decomposition of an initial current perturbation into a slow wave and a fast wave. A PIC code, WARP [1], is used to simulate this experiment and the behavior of longitudinal waves in space-charge dominated beams in an R-Z geometry. Simulations shown here also demonstrate if the initial current and velocity perturbation strengths are chosen properly, only fast or slow waves could be selectively generated.