Applications of Particle Accelerators in Europe 2 Table of Contents Applications of Particle Accelerators in Europe 1.2
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APPLICATIONS OF PARTICLE ACCELERATORS IN EUROPE 1. FOREWORD 1.1. Applications of Particle Accelerators in Europe (APAE) 1.2. Organising committee 6 IN EUROPE 2. INTRODUCTION 2.1. What is a particle accelerator? 8 2.1.1. The units used 2.2. How do particle accelerators work? 2.2.1. Electrostatic acceleration 2.2.2. Radiofrequency acceleration 2.2.3. Components of a modern accelerator layout 2.3. Types of accelerator 2.3.1. Linacs 2.3.2. Circular accelerators 2.4. What can the accelerated particles do? CONTENTS 2.5. The everyday applications of particle accelerators 2.6. Developments in accelerator technology 2.6.1. Use of superconducting components 2.6.2. New compact accelerator configurations 3. ACCELERATORS AND HEALTH APPLICATIONS OF PARTICLE ACCELERATORS ACCELERATORS OF PARTICLE APPLICATIONS 3.1. Introduction 3.2. Radiotherapy 16 3.2.1. State of the art 3.2.2. X-ray therapy 3.2.3. Particle therapy 3.2.4. Research challenges 3.2.5. Generic challenges 3.2.6. Priority areas for R&D in radiotherapy TABLE OF TABLE 3.2.7. Impact on industry and education 3.3. Radionuclides 3.3.1. State of the art 3.3.2. Radionuclide production 3.3.3. Research challenges 3.3.4. Political and social challenges 3.3.5. Priority areas for R&D in medical radionuclide production 3.3.6. Impact on industry and education 3.4. Key recommendations in funding for applications of particle accelerators to health 2 TABLE OF TABLE APPLICATIONS OF PARTICLE ACCELERATORS ACCELERATORS OF PARTICLE APPLICATIONS 4. ACCELERATORS AND INDUSTRY 42 4.I. Introduction 4.2. Very low-energy e-beams 4.2.1. Background and state of the art 4.2.2. Applications of very low-energy e-beams 4.2.3. Research challenges 4.2.4. Other challenges 4.2.5. Priority areas for R&D 4.2.6. Impact on industry and education 4.3. Low-energy e-beams 4.3.1. Background and state of the art 4.3.2. Applications of low-energy e-beams 4.3.3. Research challenges CONTENTS 4.3.4. Other challenges 4.3.5. Priority areas for R&D 4.3.6. Impact on industry and education IN EUROPE 4.4. Ion beams 4.4.1. Ion beam analysis – state of the art 4.4.2. Applications of ion beams for the environment and cultural heritage 4.4.3. Research challenges 4.4.4. Priority areas for R&D 4.4.5. Ion implantation 4.4.6. Applications of ion implantation 4.4.7. Priority areas for R&D 4.4.8. Impact on industry and education/skills transfer 4.5. Key recommendations for applications of accelerators to industry 5. ACCELERATORS AND ENERGY 5.1. Introduction 70 5.2. Solving nuclear fission problems 5.2.1. Current status 5.2.2. Destroying long-lived radioactive waste 5.2.3. Accelerator-driven transmutation 5.2.4. Accelerator-driven nuclear power generation 5.3. Paving the road towards fusion-based nuclear energy 5.3.1. Current status 5.3.2. Accelerators for intense sources of neutrons 5.4. Research challenges 5.4.1. Nuclear fission 5.4.2. Nuclear fusion 5.4.3. Other challenges – licensing aspects 5.5. Priority areas for R&D 5.6. Impact in industry and education 5.7. Key recommendations for applications of particle accelerators to energy 3 6. ACCELERATORS AND SECURITY 80 6.1. Introduction 6.2. Border security IN EUROPE 6.2.1. Current status 6.2.2. X-ray imaging 6.2.3. Use of neutrons 6.2.4. Gamma-rays 6.3. Counter-terrorism 6.4. Nuclear security 6.4.1. Support to maintaining international treaties, safeguards and nuclear arms control 6.4.2. Support to stockpile stewardship 6.5. Research challenges 6.5.1. Border security CONTENTS 6.5.2. Nuclear security 6.6. Other challenges 6.7. Priority areas for R&D in security 6.8. Impact on industry and education 6.8.1. Industry 6.8.2. Education 6.9. Key recommendations for applications of particle accelerators to security APPLICATIONS OF PARTICLE ACCELERATORS ACCELERATORS OF PARTICLE APPLICATIONS TABLE OF TABLE 4 TABLE OF TABLE APPLICATIONS OF PARTICLE ACCELERATORS ACCELERATORS OF PARTICLE APPLICATIONS 7. ACCELERATORS AND PHOTON SOURCES 7.1. Introduction 88 7.1.1. Current use of photon sources in research 7.2. State of the art 7.2.1. Synchrotron-based light sources 7.2.2. Linac-based light sources 7.2.3. Compton sources 7.2.4. Advantages and disadvantages of the diferent light sources 7.3. Research challenges 7.3.1. SRs 7.3.2. SASE FELs 7.3.3. ERLs 7.4. Other challenges CONTENTS 7.5. Priority areas for R&D 7.5.1. Compact FELs using plasma-wave accelerators 7.5.2. Accelerator on a chip IN EUROPE 7.6. Impact on industry and education 7.6.1. Industry 7.6.2. Education 7.7. Key recommendations for applications of particle accelerators to photon sources 8. ACCELERATORS AND NEUTRON SOURCES 8.1. Introduction 8.1.2. Applications of neutron scattering 102 8.2. State of the art 8.2.1. Neutrons from research reactors 8.2.2. Neutrons from particle accelerators 8.3. Current usage of neutron sources 8.4. Compact neutron sources (CNSs) 8.5. Research challenges 8.6. Other challenges 8.7. Priority areas for R&D 8.8. Impact on industry and education 8.9. Key recommendations for applications of particle accelerators to neutron sources 9. A SUMMARY OF KEY RECOMMENDATIONS FOR APPLICATIONS OF PARTICLE ACCELERATORS 112 5 1. FOREWORD PARTICLE ACCELERATORS ARE SOPHISTICATED MACHINES, WHICH, IN PROVIDING ENERGY TO SUBATOMIC PARTICLES, MAKE THEM CAPABLE OF INTERACTING WITH ATOMIC NUCLEI, OF GENERATING NEW PARTICLES, OF PRODUCING INTENSE STREAMS OF X-RAYS OR NEUTRONS, AND OF PRECISELY DELIVERING THEIR ENERGY TO MATERIALS OR IN EUROPE BIOLOGICAL CELLS. In less than the 90 years since their invention, accelerators have propelled modern science – contributing to more than one-third of the Nobel prizes in physics – and they have reached well beyond fundamental research towards applied science and market applications. Although the most visible accelerators are the large machines employed in particle physics, of the more than 30,000 accelerators that currently exist in the world, only less than 1 per cent operate for the benefit of fundamental research; the large majority are small accelerators used for healthcare or in industry. The transition of accelerator technology, from its use in basic science to applications more directly benefiting society, has been a very visible trend in recent decades; and that represents only the first step in a major evolution for particle accelerators. While accelerators for basic research are growing in dimensions and complexity, the increasing expansion and accessibility of accelerator technologies, together with the emergence of smaller, compact designs, are fostering their spread across a wealth of applications in fields as diverse as health, industry, energy, security, and the environment. All these accelerator applications share a common drive to move beyond the traditional chemical approaches used in 1. FOREWORD analysis and material transformations to those that rely on interactions at the atomic and subatomic scale, thus opening up new opportunities in terms of novel APPLICATIONS OF PARTICLE ACCELERATORS ACCELERATORS OF PARTICLE APPLICATIONS products, industrial processes, and techniques addressing societal problems. These include improving cancer treatment and medical diagnostics, reducing air pollution and treating radioactive waste. 1.1. APPLICATIONS OF PARTICLE ACCELERATORS IN EUROPE (APAE) Applications of Particle Accelerators in Europe (APAE) is an EU project, launched in June 2015, which aims to show how the accelerator technology, developed as a result of accelerator research, is of benefit to the wider community. It is organised by Work Package 4 of the EuCARD2 project, an Integrating Activity Project for coordinated Research and Development on Particle Accelerators, co- funded by the European Commission under the FP7 Capacities. The APAE project aims to promote the development of novel accelerator technologies and to identify new applications in six sectors: › Health – accelerators produce particles and radiation for radiotherapy, and make radionuclides for clinical applications. › Industry – accelerators generate electron beams and ion beams for materials analysis and modification. › Energy – accelerators can be employed in the transmutation of nuclear waste and in nuclear fusion. › Security – accelerators generate X-rays, gamma-rays and neutrons required for screening operations in border security, counter-terrorism and nuclear security. › Analysis with photons – the accelerator-based production of very bright electromagnetic radiation (mostly X-rays) for studies of the structure and behaviour of a wide variety of materials at the atomic and molecular scales using a variety of X-ray analytical techniques such as crystallography. The main photon sources used are synchrotrons and free electron lasers. › Analysis with neutrons – the accelerator-based production of neutron beams via spallation for studies of the structure and behaviour of materials at the atomic and molecular scales using neutron-scattering techniques. This document explains the current state of the art in accelerator technology and how accelerators are used in these applied areas. It also identifies the key future developments that would be 6 beneficial to these sectors. 1. FOREWORD APPLICATIONS OF PARTICLE ACCELERATORS ACCELERATORS OF PARTICLE APPLICATIONS EUROPE’S ROLE Europe hosts a large infrastructure of accelerator laboratories dedicated to applied research or medical treatments, a wide network of advanced universities and research centres active in the accelerator field, as well as established companies and innovative SMEs producing accelerator components and complete small- scale accelerators. This dynamic environment makes Europe a world-leader in developing and exploiting accelerator technology to the advantage of society. The ambition of the European Commission and the main European national agencies is to maintain this leading position, with the goal of improving the quality of life of European citizens, while generating employment and economic growth.