Beat Bunching, A Proposal for Producting Picosecond Electron Pulses

A new method of producing single fine structure pulses of electrons is presented. A prebuncher operating at a whole number fraction of the fundamental (3/4, 5/6 etc.) is used. Electrons will only be accepted when the prebuncher is in phase with the buncher which occurs at the beat frequency. Stray electrons preclude the use of this simple system in a high current Linac but use of a wide band travelling wave prebuncher powered at the fundamental and beating frequency simultaneously produces even better results. Detailed calculations to predict the performance of the system are presented.