Longitudinal emittance growth due to nonlinear space charge effect

Emittance posts limits on the key requirements of final pulse length and spot size on target in heavy ion fusion drivers. In this paper, we show studies on the effect of nonlinear space charge on longitudinal emittance growth in the drift compression section. We perform simulations, using the 3D PIC code WARP, for a high current beam under conditions of bends and longitudinal compression. The linear growth rate for longitudinal emittance turns out to depend only on the peak line charge density, and is independent of pulse length, velocity tilt, and/or the pipe and beam size. This surprisingly simple result is confirmed by simulations and analytic calculations.