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news release:
Protons are successfully
accelerated at the J-PARC Linac
Tokai, Japan, 31 January 2007: A milestone was set by the Linac (linear
accelerator) of J-PARC
(Japan Proton Accelerator Research Complex) on January 24, 2007. Protons
were, for the first time, successfully accelerated to the designed energy of the
Linac (181 million electron-volts, traveling at about half the speed of light).
This marks the first step in commissioning of the high intensity proton
accelerator complex, jointly built by the two national institutions, Japan
Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) and High Energy Accelerator Research Organization (KEK).
Negatively charged hydrogen atoms are accelerated to the designed energy through
a series of accelerator components; Radio Frequency Quadruple (RFQ), Drift Tube
Linac (DTL) and Separated-type Drift Tube Linac (SDTL). The average electric
current was one quarter micro-ampere. "We saw the first successful beam
acceleration through the RFQ last November, and we expected to complete the beam
acceleration with the rest of the 120 meters Linac by the coming spring" says
the linac manager Kazuo Hasegawa. "We are much delighted to have achieved the
designed beam energy by three months ahead of the schedule. Of course we still
have to work very hard to reach the designed beam current of two hundreds
microamperes on average."
Two institutions started construction of J-PARC in 2001, and they are working to
complete the construction of a kilometer wide accelerator complex by 2009. It is
built at the Tokai Campus of JAEA, which is located approximately 100 km
northeast of Tokyo. The 3 GeV rapid cycling synchrotron (RCS) will be used for a
1 MW neutron spallation source and muon source. The 50 GeV synchrotron with 0.75
MW proton beams will generate various secondary particles, such as neutrinos for
T2K experiment and kaon beams for the study of kaonic nuclei, hypernucleim and
kaon rare-decays.
"We will offer a world-class high power proton beam in various fields of
research," says the J-PARC director Shoji Nagamiya. "The beam power is a product
of the beam energy and the current. It is our next goal to inject proton beams
from the linac into the 3 GeV synchrotron. Also, our next goal is to increase
the beam current at the Linac. We plan to start injecting protons into the 3 GeV
synchrotron by this fall."
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