Linacs with self-acceleration of bunched beam

Application possibilities of charged particle accelerators are notably determined by the magnitude of output beam energy and its variation range. Conventional methods of beam energy increase require additional rf generators, their cost coming to 40-50% of total accelerator cost. Thus, new methods of energy increase without raise of RF power supply are of great interest. Works in this field are being carried out in the USA (SLAC) and the USSR (HPTI, MEPI). This paper is devoted to theoretical and experimental study of variable energy accelerators based on out autoacceleration of bunched relativistic beam. Besides main design principles illustrated by two new accelerator structures are discussed. The investigation has been carried out on special experimental equipment. Experimental and theoretical results obtained in this work as well as their analysis allow us to emphasize that proposed accelerator studies can be widely used for different purposes