Final focus system for injection into a laser plasma accelerator

Abstract

ARES is an electron linear accelerator at the SINBAD facility at DESY. It aims to deliver reliable high-brightness beams with an energy in the range of 100 to 150 MeV with fs to sub-fs bunch lengths. This is ideal for injection into novel high-gradient acceleration devices, such as dielectric laser accelerators and laser-plasma accelerators (LPAs), which feature fields with fs to ps period. Here, we report the conceptual design of a final focus system for injecting into an LPA experiment at ARES. The design includes permanent magnetic quadrupoles (PMQ), sufficient longitudinal space for collinear laser and electron transport, space for required diagnostics and an LPA setup. The performance of the design is evaluated by means of start-to-end simulations of the linac, focusing system, and injection into the LPA, including sensitivity studies to relevant error sources.