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Ion source development over the last 20 years at the IMP is reviewed. For versatile purposes, several types of ion sources have been involved in the research and development work at the IMP, i.e., the highly charged ECR (Electron Cyclotron Resonance) ion source, intense microwave ion source or the 2.45 GHz intense beam ECR ion source, and laser ion source (LIS). In the development of ECR ion sources, SECRAL (Superconducting ECR ion source with Advanced design in Lanzhou), Lanzhou ECR ion source, and Lanzhou all permanent magnet ECR ion source series have been made, which can cover the operation microwave frequency range of 10–28 GHz. The LIS with an Nd:YAG laser with a maximum output energy of 8 J in 8 ns pulse duration has been developed for very intense short pulse ion beams from solid materials such as C, Ti, Ni, Ag, and so on. Microwave ion sources have been built to produce intense pulsed or direct current beams from several mA to 100 mA for either high intensity accelerators or applications. This paper will give an overview of the high intensity ion source development at the IMP, especially on the recent progress and new results, such as the status of the fourth generation ECR ion source (first fourth generation ECR ion source), the production of recorded highly charged ion beams with SECRAL sources, key technology research studies, and so on. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A negative hydrogen (H-) ion source with hot cathode arc discharge was designed and fabricated as a primary injector for a 10 MeV PET cyclotron at IMP. 1 mA dc H- beam with ε N RMS = 0.08 ж mm mrad was extracted at 25 kV. Halbach hexapole was adopted to confine the plasma. The state of arc discharge, the parameters including filament current, arc current, gas pressure, plasma electrode bias, and the ratio of ... were experimentally studied. The discussion on the result, and opinions to improve the source were given. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A Low-Energy intense-highly charged ion Accelerator Facility (LEAF) program has been launched at Institute of Modern Physics. This accelerator facility consists of a superconducting Electron Cyclotron Resonance (ECR) ion source, a Low Energy Beam Transport (LEBT) system, and a Radio Frequency Quadrupole (RFQ). It is especially of interest for the extracted ion beam from the ECR ion source, which is transversely coupled, and this property will significantly affect the beam transmission in the LEBT line and the matching with the downstream RFQ. In the beam transport design of LEAF, beam decoupling in the LEBT is considered to lower down the projection emittances and the feasibility of the design has been verified by beam simulation with a transversely coupled beam from the ECR ion source. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To satisfy the requirements of surface and atomic physics study in the field of low energy multiple charge state ion incident experiments, a low energy (10 eV/q–20 keV/q) ion beam platform is under design at IMP. A simple test bench has been set up to test the ion beam deceleration systems. Considering virtues such as structure simplicity, easy handling, compactness, cost saving, etc., an all-permanent magnet ECRIS LAPECR1 [Lanzhou all-permanent magnet electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) ion source No. 1] working at 14.5 GHz has been adopted to produce intense medium and low charge state ion beams. LAPECR1 source has already been ignited. Some intense low charge state ion beams have been produced on it, but the first test also reveals that many problems are existing on the ion beam transmission line. The ion beam transmission mismatches result in the depressed performance of LAPECR1, which will be discussed in this paper. To obtain ultralow energy ion beam, after being analyzed by a double-focusing analyzer magnet, the selected ion beam will be further decelerated by two afocal deceleration lens systems, which is still under design. This design has taken into consideration both ions slowing down and also ion beam focusing. In this paper, the conceptual design of deceleration system will be discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There has been increasing demand to provide higher beam intensity and high enough beam energy for heavy ion accelerator and some other applications, which has driven electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) ion source to produce higher charge state ions with higher beam intensity. One of development trends for highly charged ECR ion source is to build new generation ECR sources by utilization of superconducting magnet technology. SECRAL (superconducting ECR ion source with advanced design in Lanzhou) was successfully built to produce intense beams of highly charged ion for Heavy Ion Research Facility in Lanzhou (HIRFL). The ion source has been optimized to be operated at 28 GHz for its maximum performance. The superconducting magnet confinement configuration of the ion source consists of three axial solenoid coils and six sextupole coils with a cold iron structure as field booster and clamping. An innovative design of SECRAL is that the three axial solenoid coils are located inside of the sextupole bore in order to reduce the interaction forces between the sextupole coils and the solenoid coils. For 28 GHz operation, the magnet assembly can produce peak mirror fields on axis of 3.6 T at injection, 2.2 T at extraction, and a radial sextupole field of 2.0 T at plasma chamber wall. During the commissioning phase at 18 GHz with a stainless steel chamber, tests with various gases and some metals have been conducted with microwave power less than 3.5 kW by two 18 GHz rf generators. It demonstrates the performance is very promising. Some record ion beam intensities have been produced, for instance, 810 e μA of O7+, 505 e μA of Xe20+, 306 e μA of Xe27+, and so on. The effect of the magnetic field configuration on the ion source performance has been studied experimentally. SECRAL has been put into operation to provide highly charged ion beams for HIRFL facility since May 2007. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two high magnetic field hexapoles for electron cyclotron resonance ion source (ECRIS) have successfully fabricated to provide sufficient radial magnetic confinement to the ECR plasma. The highest magnetic field at the inner pole tip of one of the magnets exceeds 1.5 T, with the inner diameter (i.d.)=74 mm. The other hexapole magnet provides more than 1.35 T magnetic field at the inner pole tip, and the i.d. is 84 mm. In this article, we discuss the necessity to have a good radial magnetic field confinement and the importance of a Halbach hexapole to a high performance ECRIS. The way to design a high magnetic field Halbach structure hexapole and one possible solution to the self-demagnetization problem are both discussed. Based on the above discussions, two high magnetic field hexapoles have been fabricated to be utilized on two high performance ECRISs in Lanzhou. The preliminary results obtained from the two ECR ion sources are given. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Superconducting electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) ion source with advanced design in Lanzhou (SECRAL) is a next generation ECR ion source and aims for developing a very compact superconducting ECR ion source with a structure and high performances for highly charged ion-beam production. The ion source was designed to be operated at 18 GHz at initial operation and finally will be extended to 28 GHz. The superconducting magnet confinement configuration of the ion source consists of three axial solenoid coils and six sextupole coils with a cold iron structure as field booster and clamping. At full excitation, this magnet assembly can produce peak mirror fields on the axis of 3.6 T at injection, 2.2 T at extraction, and a radial sextupole field of 2.0 T at plasma chamber wall. What is different from the traditional design, such as LBNL VENUS and LNS SERSE, is that the three axial solenoid coils are located inside of the sextupole bore in order to reduce the interaction forces between the sextupole coils and the solenoid coils. SECRAL may open the way for building a compact and high-performance 18–28 GHz superconducting ECR ion source. Very preliminary commissioning results are promising. Detailed design, construction issues and very preliminary test results of the ion source at 18 GHz are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intense heavy ion beams have been produced from IMP 14.5 GHz LECR3 by optimization of the ion source conditions and transmission efficiency. Highly charged stable beams, such as 325 eμA of Ar11+, 95 eμA of Xe26+, 7 eμA of Xe30+, 140 eμA of Fe13+, and 75 eμA of Ni12+, were obtained by 14.5 GHz rf power 800–1000 W. Furthermore, an advanced superconducting ECR ion source named SECRAL is being constructed. SECRAL is designed to operate at rf frequency 18–28 GHz with axial mirror magnetic fields 4.0 T at injection, 2.2 T at extraction, and sextupole field 2.0 T at the plasma chamber wall. The unique feature of this superconducting ECR source is that the sextupole is located outside of the three axial solenoid coils to reduce the interaction force and make the source more compact. Fabrications of the superconducting coils, cryostat, beam transmission line, and other components are almost completed. Tests of the superconducting magnet with sextupole and solenoid coils are under way. © 2004 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Uranium ion beams were produced from electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) ion sources by sputtering method this year at the Institute of Modern Physics. At first, we chose the Lanzhou ECR No. 3 ion source to implement the production experiment of U ion beams. Finally, 11 e μA of U28+, 5 e μA of U32+, and 1.5 e μA of U35+ were obtained. A U26+ ion beam produced by the LECR2 ion source was accelerated successfully by the cyclotron. This means that the Heavy Ion Research Facility in Lanzhou (HIRFL) has accomplished the acceleration of the ion beam of the heaviest element according to the designed parameters. The Lanzhou ECR ion source No. 2 (LECR2), which was built in 1997, has served the HIRFL for eight years and needed to be upgraded to provide more intense high charge state ion beams for HIRFL cooling storage ring. We started the upgrading project of LECR2 last year, and the modified design just has been finished. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to diagnose the electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) plasma, electron bremsstrahlung spectra were measured by a HPGe detector on Lanzhou ECR Ion Source No. 3 at IMP. The ion source was operated with argon under various working conditions, including different microwave power, mixing gas, extraction high voltage (HV), and so on. Some of the measured spectra are presented in this article. The dependence of energetic electron population on mixing gas and extraction HV is also described. Additionally, we are looking forward to further measurements on SECRAL (Superconducting ECR Ion Source with Advanced design at Lanzhou). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) ion sources have been used for atomic physics research for a long time. With the development of atomic physics research in the Institute of Modern Physics (IMP), additional high performance experimental facilities are required. A 300 kV high voltage (HV) platform has been under construction since 2003, and an all permanent magnet ECR ion source is supposed to be put on the platform. Lanzhou all permanent magnet ECR ion source No. 2 (LAPECR2) is a latest developed all permanent magnet ECRIS. It is a 900 kg weight and [nullset_(circle_with_slash-through)]650 mm×562 mm outer dimension (magnetic body) ion source. The injection magnetic field of the source is 1.28 T and the extraction magnetic field is 1.07 T. This source is designed to be running at 14.5 GHz. The high magnetic field inside the plasma chamber enables the source to give good performances at 14.5 GHz. LAPECR2 source is now under commissioning in IMP. In this article, the typical parameters of the source LAPECR2 are listed, and the typical results of the preliminary commissioning are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To study the injection of additional electrons from an external electron gun into the plasma of a Penning ionization gauge (PIG) ion source, a test bench for the external electron-beam enhancement of the PIG (E-PIG) ion source was set up. A source magnet assembly was built to satisfy the request for magnetic field configuration of the E-PIG ion source. Numerical calculations have been done to optimize the magnetic field configuration so as to fit the primary electrons to be fed into the PIG discharge chamber along the spreading magnetic field lines. Many possible methods for improving the performance and stability of the PIG ion source have been used in the E-PIG ion source, including the use of multicrystal LaB6 cathode and optimized axial magnetic field. This article presents a detailed design of the E-PIG ion source. Substantial enhancement of ion charge state is expected to be observed which demonstrates that the E-PIG is a viable alternative to other much more costly and difficult to operate devices for the production of intense ion beams of higher charge state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With a latest developed electric-sweep scanner system, we have done a lot of experiments for studying this scanner system and ion beam emittance of electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) ion source. The electric-sweep scanner system was installed on the beam line of Lanzhou electron resonance ion source No. 3 experimental platform of Institute of Modern Physics. The repetition experiments have proven that the system is a relatively dependable and reliable emittance scanner, and its experiment error is about 10%. We have studied the influences of the major parameters of ECR ion source on the extracted ion beam emittance. The typical results of the experiments and the conclusions are presented in this article. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many experiments have been made to produce metallic ion beams since 1998 at IMP (Institute of Modern Physics). We have designed a small oven that can reach a temperature of more than 1300 °C using 110 W electric power. Typical ion beam currents of 70 eμA of Ca12+, 60 eμA of Mg8+, 25 eμA of Pb27+ have been provided to the IMP cyclotron operation by the LECR2 (LanZhou ECR No. 2). We have also obtained some good results by the metallic ions from volatile compounds method on LECR3 (LanZhou ECR No. 3). © 2004 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to study the transmission properties of multicharged ion beams between the electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) ion source and the analyzing magnet, a new diagnostic system composed of three Wien filters with three single wires has been built and installed on the IMP ECR source test bench. The single wire is used to measure the beam profile and the beam density distribution, and the Wien filter is used to measure the charge state distribution of ion beam. The single wire and the Wien filter were tested successfully. With this diagnostic system, the beam profile, charge state distributions and beam losses along the transmission line from IMP LECR3 to the analyzing magnet are experimentally studied in different conditions of the ion source. © 2004 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We have designed and built an emittance scanner which was installed at the beam line of IMP LECR3. The scanner measures the emittance of ECR ion source by the method of electric-sweep, typically named as Electric-Sweep Scanner (ESS). The horizontal and vertical emittances were both measured by two ESSs at the beam line of IMP LECR3. Some preliminary results were obtained. The detailed results and discussions will be presented. © 2004 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We are developing a multicharged ion beam transport program. The program is dedicated to numerical simulation of the behavior of highly charged ion beam and optimization of beam optics in transport lines and is realized on a PC with Windows user interface of Microsoft Visual Basic. Among all the ions with different charge states in the beam, the exchange of electrons between highly charged ions and low charged ions or neutral atoms of residual gas are taken into account using classical molecular over-barrier model and Monte Carlo method. Therefore, the code is able to describe the changing charge state distribution along the transmission line. The initial charged state distribution of ions may be input from experimental data or calculated from some classical density distribution such as uniform, Gaussian, water bag, or parabolic. The main advantage of the code is the ability to simultaneously simulate a number of ions with different masses and charge states, particularly the decrease of the highly charge ions and the increase of low charged ions due to electron capture. Some simulation results for a transmission line of a highly charged ECR ion source are presented. © 2004 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, many research activities on atomic physics have been carried out in the Institute of Modern Physics and with the broadening of the research fields, besides the present electron cyclotron resonance ion source (ECRIS) in Lanzhou, some extra high performance ECR ion sources are demanded. Now, an ECRIS put on a high voltage (HV) platform, which can be applied to a HV up to 300 kV is under construction. For the sake of high electric power consumption and some critical engineering requirements, an all permanent magnet instead of a solenoid coil ECRIS is adopted. The axial magnetic mirror peaks are 1.45 and 1.17 T at the injection and extraction side, respectively. The inner diameter of the plasma chamber is designed to be 67 mm while keeping the radial magnetic field at the inner wall of the plasma chamber up to 1.2 T. Some interesting aspects on designing the hexapole as well as optimization design of the source will be presented. © 2004 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) ion source (LECR3—Lanzhou Electron Cyclotron Resonance Ion Source No. 3) has been constructed this year. The main purpose of this source is to provide highly charged ion beams for atomic physics and surface physics research. The design of this ion source is based on the IMP 14.5 GHz ECR ion source (LECR2—Lanzhou Electron Cyclotron Resonance Ion Source No. 2) with double rf heating by inserting waveguide directly and aluminum chamber. Furthermore, the volume of the plasma chamber is larger than that of LECR2 so as to increase the rf power and improve beam intensity for highly charged ions. But the hexapole field on the chamber wall is kept the same value in order to compare with the performance of LECR2. After only four days conditioning the first test results were obtained. The final result of this ion source is expected to be better than LECR2's. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]