Progress of SRF Gun Development and Operation at the ELBE Accelerator

Superconducting RF photo guns are suitable candidates for electron injectors in future free-electron lasers and energy recovery linacs. For the radiation source ELBE an SRF gun was build and put into operation. During long-term tests, the operation of normal-conducting photocathodes in the superconducting cavity has been successfully demonstrated. At moderate average currents of some hundreds of μA the Cs2Te photocathodes possess excellent lifetime. The gun's acceleration gradient is the key parameters for beam emittance and the maximum achievable bunch charge of the gun. Therefore two new cavities with higher performance were developed, built and treated. The final tests of these cavities are ongoing. An upgraded cryomodule with an integrated superconducting solenoid was built.