Traceable charge measurement of the pulses of a 27 MeV electron beam from a linear accelerator

Abstract

This work presents a detailed description of measuring devices and calibration procedures which enable the nondestructive (non-intercepting) absolute measurement of the charge of individual beam pulses (macro-pulses) from an electron linear accelerator traceable to primary standards with high accuracy, i.e. with an expanded measurement uncertainty < 0.1%. In particular, we demonstrate the readout and calibration of a Bergoz integrating current transformer which is frequently applied at many different types of accelerators as a beam intensity monitor. The current transformer signal is calibrated against the absolute charge measurement by means of a custom-made compact Faraday cup with a high degree of collection efficiency for electron beams in the energy range of 6 MeV to 50 MeV (99.2% at 27 MeV), which is well known from measurements and consistently described by Monte Carlo calculations.