Principal Investigator Richard Milner
Co-investigators Karen Dow , Evgeni P Tsentalovich , Ernest E Ihloff , James E Kelsey , Robert Redwine
Project Website http://web.mit.edu/lns/research/bates.html
The study of the physics of beams and particle accelerators is essential to research in nuclear and high energy physics. In addition, accelerators have wide application across many fields of science and are essential to medicine and national security. Particle beams typically comprise systems of ~ 10 10 particles, obey the known laws of electricity and magnetism and their acceleration and manipulation in a controlled way presents many challenges to physicists. At the Laboratory for Nuclear Science's Bates Linear Accelerator Center, new accelerators and the physics of beams are studied. There are a number of research projects underway at present:
(*) Design of a high luminosity (~ 10 33 cm -2 s -1 ) electron ion collider (EIC) for the study of QCD. EIC requires intense beams of electrons to collide with intense beams of protons and heavy nuclei. Both beams must be polarized and the center-of-mass energy must be in the range 30 to 100 GeV. Challenges include: maintaining a high degree of spin polarization in both beams; attaining a high collision luminosity; and designing an interaction region consistent with the required detector design.
(*) Development of high intensity polarized electron sources. Bates scientists have extensive experience and expertise in delivery of intense beams of polarized electrons. Accelerators in the planning stage, e.g. EIC and the International Linear Collider (ILC), will require development of a new generation of polarized electron sources with challenging timing and intensity specifications.
(*) Demonstration of optical stochastic cooling. Low emittance beams are essential for high luminosity. A promising scheme for low emittance proton beams at high energies (~ 0.2 to 1 TeV) is to use optical stochastic cooling. An experiment to demonstrate this technique for the first time using the Bates South Hall Ring is in preparation.
(*) Study of intense polarized beams in storage rings. Highly relativistic spin polarized beams in storage rings are predicted to produce spin-dependent electromagnetic radiation in a tuned cavity. If detectable, this could be used to measure the polarization of the stored beam. An experiment to detect this radiation for the first time at the Bates South Hall Ring is in preparation.
(*) Development of sources of Terahertz radiation. Bates scientists have produced coherent synchrotron radiation in the Terahertz region using the Bates South Hall Ring. This radiation falls in a region of the electromagnetic spectrum where few sources have existed previously and where there is significant scientific interest in the areas of life and material sciences.
All of these research projects involve collaboration between Bates physicists and scientists at other laboratories. Excellent opportunities exist for MIT Physics graduate students to carry out research towards a PhD in accelerator physics. Students will have the opportunity to work at frontier existing accelerators e.g. the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) at Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, New York and the Continuous Electron Beam Accelerator Facility (CEBAF) at Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility, Newport News, Virginia. Interested students should contact Prof. Richard Milner (milner@mit.edu).