Materials for Accelerator Technology

The development of particle physics requires accelerators which produce particle beams with increasingly high energy and intensity. This leads unavoidably to increasingly large demands on the materials surrounding the particle beam. In future accelerator concepts such as CLIC, the accelerating components themselves are subject to damage due to instabilities in the intense radiofrequency fields used to accelerate the beam. Already in LHC, the enormous amounts of particles produced in the particle reactions will cause great radiation damage to the very same solid state detectors which are used to detect them.

This HIP theory programme activity during 2008-2013 utilizes the wide existing knowhow of Prof. Kai Nordlund and Doc. Flyura Djurabekova in the fields of radiation effects in metals and semiconductors to examine the radiation damage in present and future particle accelerators. We examine the fundamental mechanisms by which the damage in the accelerator components form, with the aim to use the increased understanding to design materials and components, which withstand the damage optimally well. We also study the properties of nanocrystals embedded in solids with respect to their mechanical, optical and thermodynamic properties.

These activities are a central part of the activities of the materials physics simulation group of the Department of Physics.

Additional funding resources are provided by

• Academy of Finland postdoctoral researcher (2015-2018)
• Waldemar von Frenckells Stiftelse (2015)
• CERN K-contract (2015-2017)
• Ruth och Nils-Erik Stenbäcks Stiftelse (2014-2015)
• Waldemar von Frenckells Stiftelse (2014)
• Academy of Finland project AMELIS (2013-2017)
• Academy of Finland project MECBETH (2008-2012)
• Doctoral Programme in Materials Research and Nanosciences (MATRENA)
• The Kristjan Jaak Scholarship programme from Archimedes Foundation