Publication of the ELENA Design Report
Antiprotons, stored and cooled at low energies in a storage ring or at rest in traps, are highly desirable for the investigation of a large number of basic questions on fundamental interactions, on the static structure of exotic antiprotonic atomic systems or of (radioactive) nuclei as well as on the time-dependent quantum dynamics of correlated systems. Fundamental studies include for example CPT tests by high-resolution spectroscopy of the 1s-2s transition or of the ground-state hyperfine structure of antihydrogen, as well as gravity experiments with antimatter. Antimatter experiments are at the cutting edge of science; they are, however, very difficult to realize.
To overcome the present limitations of the only existing low energy antimatter facility in the world, the Antiproton Decelerator (AD) at CERN, an Extra Low ENergy Antiproton ring (ELENA) shall be built at CERN. The ELENA Design Report has now been published and is available online.
This report gives a full description of the ELENA Ring to be built at CERN. ELENA will further decelerate the antiprotons coming from the AD at the momentum of 100 MeV/c down to 13.7 MeV/c, which corresponds to the kinetic energy of 100 keV before extracting to the physics experiments in the same building. Prof. Nick Chohan, member of the QUASAR Group at the University of Liverpool and main editor of the report said: “This is an important milestone for the ELENA project and a result of a fantastic international collaboration. The ELENA ring will enable many hitherto impossible studies and pave the way for a truly unique physics program with low energy antimatter.”
The Cockcroft Institute has been a strong supporter of the ELENA project for many years and is making contributions to the design and optimization of the storage ring and beam transfer lines, as well as to the required beam diagnostics tools through the QUASAR Group.