Electron cooling for low-energy RHIC program

Electron cooling was proposed to increase luminosity of the RHIC collider for heavy ion beam energies below 10 GeV/nucleon. Providing collisions at such energies, termed RHIC 'low-energy' operation, will help to answer one of the key questions in the field of QCD about existence and location of critical point on the QCD phase diagram. The electron cooling system should deliver electron beam of required good quality over energies of 0.9-5 MeV. Several approaches to provide such cooling were considered. The baseline approach was chosen and design work started. Here we describe the main features of the cooling system and its expected performance. We have started design work on a low-energy RHIC electron cooler which will operate with kinetic electron energy range 0.86-2.8 (4.9) MeV. Several approaches to an electron cooling system in this energy range are being investigated. At present, our preferred scheme is to transfer the Fermilab Pelletron to BNL after Tevatron shutdown, and to use it for DC non-magnetized cooling in RHIC. Such electron cooling system can significantly increase RHIC luminosities at low-energy operation