High Frequency Bunches for Proton-Proton Storage Accelerators

In the post-ISR period of high energy proton-proton colliding beams, it may be necessary to reconsider the high current, continuous beam approach as a practical operating procedure. An alternative for achieving both high level performance and operational simplicity is through the use of high frequency bunches. A scheme that could be used in operating the ISABELLE facility is outlined. High-luminosity is obtained with low average current and tight bunching. The bunched mode is natural for achieving flexibility in energy variation. With sufficiently high bunch frequency, the total number of events per colliding bunch can be kept down to a value on the order of unity. The advantages of bunched operation cover the areas of current accumulation, beam loss, aperture utilization, beam handling (e. g., debunching, rebunching, and beam extraction) and synchrotron radiation. Other relevant topics are stability against growing coherent beam oscillations, the beam-beam interaction, and the rf heating induced in the vacuum chamber.