Circular-path accelerators - DOE-HDBK-1141-2001

Radiological Assessor Training

DOE-HDBK-1141-2001

Student's Guide

Linear accelerators include:

Van de Graaffs

Cockcrott-Waltons

2. Circular-path accelerators

In circular-path accelerators, magnets guide

the particle along a spiral path, allowing a

single electric field to apply many cycles of

Circular-path accelerators include:

Cyclotrons

Betatrons

Synchrotrons

Until the 1980's, all accelerators used for both

physics research and in practical applications,

such as in medicine and in materials science

operated in a so-called "fixed target" mode. In

this mode the accelerated energetic particles are

delivered to a target made of some material at

rest in the laboratory.

Since that time, research facilities have been

constructed in which counter-circulating

accelerated beams of particles collide with each

other, rather than with targets at rest in the

laboratory. The use of accelerated particles in

this "colliding beam" mode has been done to take

advantage of the fact that the total energy of the

colliding particles, including both their kinetic

energies and the energy included in their masses

at rest, becomes available in the collision

process. This condition is not true for fixed target

collisions.

Such colliders are not nearly as numerous as

other types of accelerators, but represent

Module 13 - 3