Status of the UCLA/NICADD Plasma Density Transition Trapping Experiment

Plasma density transition trapping is a recently proposed self-injection scheme for plasma wake-field accelerators. This technique uses a sharp downward plasma density transition to trap and accelerate background plasma electrons in a plasma wake-field. This paper recounts the first attempt to demonstrate density transition trapping experimentally. The goal of the experiment is to capture a ∼ 100 pC, 1.5 MeV beam with 4% rms energy spread out of a 2.5x1013 cm−3 peak density plasma using a 6nC, 14 MeV drive beam. The first experimental run occurred at the Fermilab NICADD Photoinjector Laboratory (FNPL) between January and May 2004. While several key objectives were achieved, we were unable to achieve the drive beam parameters necessary for the experiment due to technical problems. We are in the process of resolving these problems in preparation for a second experimental run.