LANL, Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA
NERS-UM, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA
A recent industrial development has made possible the use of chip-scale radiation detectors by combining a Cerium-doped Lutetium based scintillator crystal optically coupled with a Silicon Photomultiplier (SiPM) as a detector. At the Los Alamos Neutron Science Center (LANSCE), there has been an ongoing effort to determine the location of high voltage breakdowns of the accelerating radio-frequency field inside of an evacuated resonant cavity. Tests were conducted with an array of 8 X-ray detectors with each detector observing a cell of the Drift Tube Linac (DTL) cavity. The array can be moved along the DTL cavity and record X-ray emissions from a section of the cavity and their timing with respect to the RF field quench using a fast 8 channel mixed-signal oscilloscope. This new diagnostic allowed us to map the most energetic emissions along the cavity and reduce the area to investigate. A thorough visual inspection revealed that one of the ion pump grating welds in the suspected area was exposing a small gap and melting copper on both sides. Sparking across this discontinuity is believed to be a source of electrons that drive the high voltage breakdowns in the drift tube cells.
