The aim of the ANR Pinnacle project, led by LULI in collaboration with CENBG and CEA, was to develop and optimize a line of compact, high-luminosity pulsed neutron beams, using high-power lasers such as the APOLLON IR* PW-class laser.
Other tests were planned on “satellite” laser facilities (LULI, CEA-LIDYL or abroad).
Within this framework, a first experiment involving the three groups took place in 2018, on the PICO2000 facility, enabling accelerated helium ions up to 15 MeV and protons up to some 3 MeV to be observed.
AppoloNThomsoNparabolA (ANNA) measures proton and electron energy up to 100 MeV, and carbon ion energy up to 400 MeV.
We contributed to the project by designing a Thomson parabola (ANNA-AppoloNThomsoNparabolA ). The heart of the diagnostic is a powerful “yoké” magnet of around 1 Tesla, whose magnetic field has been implemented in simulation software (SIMION), in order to correctly dimension the diagnostic and then estimate the ion energies reached experimentally.
ANNA has also been designed to measure the energy distribution of very high-energy electrons (up to 200 MeV) at the same time.
This diagnostic feature was put into operation during the first experiment in a short-focus room (IR* APOLLON).
Related publications