Author: Martins, J.L.
Paper Title Page
WEPPR089 Experimental Progress: Current Filamentation Instability Study 3141
 
  • B.A. Allen, P. Muggli
    USC, Los Angeles, California, USA
  • M. Babzien, M.G. Fedurin, K. Kusche, V. Yakimenko
    BNL, Upton, Long Island, New York, USA
  • C. Huang
    LANL, Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA
  • J.L. Martins, L.O. Silva
    IPFN, Lisbon, Portugal
  • W.B. Mori
    UCLA, Los Angeles, California, USA
 
  Funding: Work supported by: National Science Foundation and US Department of Energy.
Current Filamentation Instability, CFI, is of central importance for the propagation of relativistic electron beams in plasmas. CFI has potential relevance to astrophysics, magnetic field and radiation generation in the afterglow of gamma ray bursts, and inertial confinement fusion, energy transport in the fast-igniter concept. An experimental study of this instability is underway at the Accelerator Test Facility, ATF, at Brookhaven National Laboratory with the 60MeV electron beam and centimeter length capillary discharge plasma. The experimental program includes the systematic study and characterization of the instability as a function of beam (charge, transverse and longitudinal profile) and plasma (plasma density) parameters. Specifically, the transverse beam profile is measured directly at the plasma exit using optical transition radiation from a thin gold-coated silicon window. Experimental results show the reduction of the beam transverse size and the appearance of multiple (1-4) filaments and are a function of the plasma density. We will present simulation and experimental results, provide discussion of these results and outline next steps in the experiment.