[en] MEQALAC is an acronym for a multiple-beam electrostatic-quadrupole array linear accelerator. The principle of operation is very simple. It makes use of the fact that electrostatic quadrupoles focus more effectively at low velocities than conventional magnetic quadrupoles. Moreover, the pole-tip field of an electrostatic quadrupole is limited by field emission of electrons, and is not a function of the size of the quadrupole. Conventional magnetic quadrupoles, on the other hand, require increasingly high current densities if one attempts to scale to smaller size