Energy Modulation of Electron Beam in Corrugated Dielectric Waveguide

Energy modulated electron beams have a wide range of applications in accelerator physics, for example they can serve as drivers in resonant wakefield acceleration schemes. A strong wakefield induced energy modulation can be produced using a dielectric lined waveguide [1], the resultant micro-bunched beam is capable of producing coherent terahertz radiation. We report on observation of energy modulation due to self-wakefields in a few picosecond duration and 1 nC charge electron bunches of LUCX facility at KEK. To produce the modulation, we used a corrugated dielectric waveguide with an inner radius of 2 mm and a period of corrugation of 10 mm. In this case, the period of corrugation is longer than the wavelength of the main accelerating mode. We show electromagnetic simulations of on-axis electric fields leading to an optimisation of the corrugation period allowing to enhance the accelerating/decelerating fields compared to dielectric lined waveguides with a constant inner radius.