High current electron beam transport in linear induction accelerators

In recent years a number of advanced linear induction accelerators (LIAs) have been developed which have the capability for accelerating very high electron beam currents, provided that satisfactory answers are obtained to number of beam transport and stability issues. In this review several important beam stability issues are identified pertaining to the propagation of very high current electron beams in and through the accelerating structures. In particular, criteria are developed for various equilibrium configurations, injector designs for producing the equilibria, general beam stability criteria, zero-order analyses of accelerating gap designs and considerations of various multiple-gap instabilities, including transverse beam break-up and image displacement. These analyses can be practically applied by illustrating the design of the beam transport line of the RADLAC-II accelerator. The new transport technique of ion channel guiding is briefly described