Jefferson Lab High-Power Free-Electron Laser

Abstract

In partnership with the U.S. Navy, high-technology corporations, and research universities, Jefferson Lab is building a superconducting radio-frequency (SRF) accelerator-driven free-electron laser (FEL) and is outfitting an FEL user facility. The 1 kW, 3 urn infrared (IR) laser—which was being installed in the newly constructed user facility as of summer 1997—is the first step in a program to develop high-average-power SRF-based IR and ultraviolet (UV) FELs for multiple manufacturing applications as well as for defense-related applied research and basic scientific research. This initial FEL is driven by a 42 MeV, 5 mA recirculating SRF linac closely similar to the much larger SRF linac in Jefferson Lab’s 4 GeV, 200 μA Continuous Electron Beam Accelerator Facility (CEBAF). The FEL will demonstrate 75% energy recovery. Its linac will be cooled by the existing CEBAF cryogenic system. At Jefferson Lab, an infrastructure of facilities and people already supports the advance of SRF and closely related technologies in the furtherance of the lab’s primary mission of nuclear and particle physics. This paper, after describing that infrastructure, summarizes the opportunity represented by SRF-driven FELs and reports on the program now underway to develop them.