The design of a high current, low emittance multiply charged ion source

A novel design of multicharged ion source is currently under construction at Culham Laboratory. The physical processes upon which it is based - stepwise ionisation and magnetic cusp confinement together with energy and particle balance - are described. These principles have been combined in a model from which it is possible to characterise the new source. A zero dimensional computer code has been developed to solve the model equations numerically. Results from the code are presented for the source under construction. From the results the optimum operating conditions in terms of pressure, input power and cusp field strength may be determined. (orig.)