CERN Accelerating science

Previous studies have shown the suppressing effect of direct space charge on impedance-driven head-tail instabilities. The present work investigates transverse stability for the HL-LHC scenario based on our macro-particle simulation tool PyHEADTAIL using realistic bunch distributions. The impact of selfconsistent modelling is briefly discussed for non-linear space charge forces. We study how space charge pushes the instability threshold for the transverse mode coupling instability (TMCI) occurring between mode 0 and -1. Next we consider finite chromaticity: in absence of space charge, the impedance model predicts head-tail instabilities. For a selected case below TMCI threshold at Q0 = 5, we demonstrate the stabilising effect of space charge. Finally, we compare simulation results to past LHC measurements.

PyHEADTAIL is a 6D tracking tool developed at CERN to simulate collective effects. We present recent developments of the direct space charge (SC) suite, which is available for both the CPU and GPU. A new 3D particle-in-cell solver with open boundary conditions has been implemented. For the transverse plane, there is a semi-analytical Bassetti-Erskine model as well as 2D self-consistent particle-in-cell solvers with both open and closed boundary conditions. For the longitudinal plane, PyHEADTAIL offers line density derivative models. Simulations with these models are benchmarked with experiments at the injection plateau of CERN’s SPS.