A pepper-pot emittance meter for low-energy heavy-ion beams.

A novel emittance meter has been developed to measure the four-dimensional, transverse phase-space distribution of a low-energy ion beam using the pepper-pot technique. A characteristic feature of this instrument is that the pepper-pot plate, which has a linear array of holes in the vertical direction, is scanned horizontally through the ion beam. This has the advantage that the emittance can also be measured at locations along the beam line where the beam has a large horizontal divergence.

Optimization of a charge-state analyzer for electron cyclotron resonance ion source beams.

A detailed experimental and simulation study of the extraction of a 24 keV He(+) beam from an ECR ion source and the subsequent beam transport through an analyzing magnet is presented. We find that such a slow ion beam is very sensitive to space-charge forces, but also that the neutralization of the beam's space charge by secondary electrons is virtually complete for beam currents up to at least 0.5 mA.

Radiocarbon in food: a non-problem of health effects.

Recently it has come to our attention that a paper was published in this journal entitled "recycling greenhouse gas fossil fuel emissions into low radiocarbon food products to reduce human genetic damage" (Williams in Environ Chem Lett 5:197-202, 2007). In this article, it is argued that food grown in a greenhouse is healthier for people, when the greenhouse is fertilised with CO(2) prepared from fossil fuels. In this comment, however, we argue that the effect on human health is completely negligible.

Study of ion beam extraction and transport from an electron cyclotron resonance ion source.

We have started an experimental and theoretical program to better understand the extraction and transport of intense multiply charged ion beams from an electron cyclotron resonance ion source (ECRIS). In this paper we present the first results of this program concerning a simple, monocomponent He(+) beam extracted from an ECRIS. We have calculated the ion trajectories starting from the ECRIS plasma electrode up to the image plane of the analyzing magnet taking into account space-charge effects and fringe fields.

Three-dimensional simulations of ion dynamics in an Electron Cyclotron Resonance Ion Source.

We present a three-dimensional simulation of the ion dynamics in an electron cyclotron resonance ion source. Ion trajectories in the min-B field of the source are calculated taking ion-ion and electron-ion collisions into account. The electrons are not tracked but considered as a neutralizing background with a Maxwell-Boltzmann velocity distribution.

A status report of the multipurpose superconducting electron cyclotron resonance ion source.

Intense heavy ion beam production with electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) ion sources is a common requirement for many of the accelerators under construction in Europe and elsewhere. An average increase of about one order of magnitude per decade in the performance of ECR ion sources was obtained up to now since the time of pioneering experiment of R. Geller at CEA, Grenoble, and this trend is not deemed to get the saturation at least in the next decade, according to the increased availability of powerful magnets and microwave generators.

Ion source development at KVI.

Ion source development at KVI is focused on increasing the beam intensity from the electron cyclotron resonance ion source injector and optimizing the beam transport and injection into the superconducting AGOR cyclotron. We describe several modifications that have resulted in a significant performance increase of the ion source. We also present the first results of ion transport simulations that have been performed to better understand beam losses in the extraction region and in the low-energy beam transport system.