Beam conditioning and propagation experiments on SuperIBEX

SuperIBEX produces 5 MeV electron beams with currents of 5 - 30 kA for atmospheric propagation experiments. Such beams are subject to the resistive hose instability which quickly disrupts propagation unless the beam is properly conditioned prior to injection into the atmosphere. The most successful conditioning scheme to date employs an ion-focused regime (IFR) cell to tailor the beam emittance followed by an active wire cell to center the beam. The emittance tailoring tends to 'detune' the hose instability, while the wire cell damps transverse perturbations which seed the instability. A 17 kA, 1.5 cm radius beam has been propagated in full density air to the end of the 5 m long tank without disruption. The beam has also been propagated in a density channel produced by a laser-guided electric discharge. The channel reduces beam expansion generated by scattering of beam electrons by the atmosphere. Results will be compared with simulation codes and with previous propagation experiments at other laboratories.© (1992) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.