Performance of the NANOGUN™ electron cyclotron resonance ion source applied for nuclear astrophysics

A compact low-energy, high current accelerator has been constructed for the study of fusion reactions relevant to the field of nuclear astrophysics. It consists of a modified NANOGUN™, a low-energy beam transport, a windowless gas target, a beam calorimeter, and a detector system. The accelerator and the NANOGUN ion source with a single extraction electrode provides 930 μA 3He1+ of 20 keV at a gas target chamber. A two-electrode extraction has been tested for a few source voltages. The obtained target current is 75, 140, 110, 110, 105, 78, and 80 μA for 20, 25, 30, 35, 38, 40, and 45 kV potential, respectively. The transport efficiency from the source to the target is 5.7%.