AWAKE-UK 2014–2015 bridging request

"The AWAKE project at CERN aims to demonstrate proton-driven plasma wakefield accelertaion for the first time. This will be carried out using the SPS proton beam in the CNGS facility. A wakefield will be excited in a plasma column which the modulates the current of the proton beam splitting it up into micro-bunches. These constructively interfere to create a high amplitude wakefield that will accelerate injected electrons from 15 MeV to 2 GeV in 6 m of plasma.

The understanding of the self-modulation process, the development of long, scalable and uniform plasma cells and the development of schemes for production and acceleration of short proton bunches could lead to a future stage of AWAKE in which electrons are accelerated to 100 GeV in 100 m of plasma. Application of this technology to high-energy particle facilities such as a future linear collider, LHeC, or a fixed-target and test-beam facility is the ultimate goal."

"Progress has been made towards an experimental demonstration of a beam driven plasma wakefield accelerator.
The experiments at CERN will be carried out over the next few years."