The Eindhoven High-Brightness Electron Programme

The Eindhoven High-Brightness programme is aimed at producing ultra-short intense electron bunches from compact accelerators. The RF electron gun is capable of producing 100 fs electron bunches at 7.5 MeV and 10 pC bunch charge. The DC/RF hybrid gun under development will produce bunches <75 fs at 9.5 MeV, 10 pC. These bunches are suitable for injection into a Laser Wakefield Accelerator (LWA). Injection of electron bunches from the RF photogun into a 1 cm capillary discharge channel with 2×1018 cm-3 electron density and a 2 TW drive laser allows acceleration of the electrons to 50 ± 20MeV. This combination of hardware will be employed to demonstrate controlled laser wakefield acceleration. If the plasma channel can be adapted to work at lower pressures, around 2×1017 cm-3, a 5 cm channel, in combination with the DC/RF gun will produce bunches with energies of 50 ± 5Me