Particle Beam Cooling

Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Cooling techniques are important for the control the emittance of particle beams in particle accelerators. Usually, these techniques take advantage, in some way, of the electric or the magnetic fields present in the fast-moving bunches of particles in the accelerator in clever ways to damp the tenancy of these particles to repel each other. It is accurate to think of these techniques as thermodynamic cooling, or the reduction of entropy, in much the same way that a refrigerator or an air conditioner cools its contents.A particle beam is an accelerated stream of charged particles or neutrons (often moving at very near the speed of light) which may be directed by magnets and focused by electrostatic lenses, although they may also be self-focusing (see Pinch).