At TARLA, the linear electron accelerator, equipped with two beamlines and five experimental stations, generates [...]]]> The Turkish Accelerator Radiation Laboratory (TARLA) is a multi-purpose and multidisciplinary research facility to promote scientific and technical knowledge on accelerator science and serve researchers and industry “the-state-of-art” capabilities. It is located on the Gölbaşı Ankara University Campus near Ankara.

At TARLA, the linear electron accelerator, equipped with two beamlines and five experimental stations, generates an electron beam with a kinetic energy of up to 40 MeV. This beam is used for Free Electron Laser (FEL) light generation, Bremsstrahlung (gamma radiation) and secondary particle experiments. Furthermore, FEL light is also used in experiments coupled to Pump-Probe and SPM systems. TARLA’s light generation capability spans a wide spectral range from UV to Mid-IR, opening up new research avenues in light & material interaction.

We are an active user of EPICS for the control system development of laser-driven particle accelerators. [...]]]> The Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) is a National Centre of the Government of India, under the umbrella of the Department of Atomic Energy. At TIFR Hyderabad, we carry out interdisciplinary research in physics, chemistry, biology and mathematics.

We are an active user of EPICS for the control system development of laser-driven particle accelerators. We are currently involved in two major projects that use the EPICS framework:

1. The Petawatt Laser particle accelerator
   We are at the frontiers of laser-matter interactions by exciting matter with intense, femtosecond laser pulses, which can create extremely ultra-dense, hot plasmas – a highly excited state of matter.
   The commissioning of the Ti-Sapphire Laser System of petawatt class power is in the pipeline, for which EPICS is the core middleware for control system design. The provision of two output beams at approx. 25 fs pulse duration is being planned: One Low Energy Beam with 50 TW at 5 Hz repetition rate and one High Energy Beam with 1 PW at 1 Hz.
2. The Extreme Photonics Innovation Centre
   Funded by the UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), this £4 million centre jointly established between UK’s Central Laser Facility (CLF) and Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) is aimed at developing technology for next-generation accelerators using lasers. We are jointly developing control systems for various laser facilities in CLF as well as in TIFR.

J-PARC has three proton accelerators: the 400 MeV proton linac (LINAC), the 3 GeV rapid-cycle synchrotron (RCS), and the 30 GeV Main Ring (MR). With its MW-class high power proton beams, various researches have been carrying out [...]]]> The Japan Proton Accelerator Research Complex (J-PARC) is an exciting accelerator research facility in Ibaraki, Japan, operated by a cooperation between KEK and JAEA.

J-PARC has three proton accelerators: the 400 MeV proton linac (LINAC), the 3 GeV rapid-cycle synchrotron (RCS), and the 30 GeV Main Ring (MR). With its MW-class high power proton beams, various researches have been carrying out at three experimental facilities: materials and life science experimental facility (MLF), hadron experimental facility (HD), and neutrino experimental facility (NU).
J-PARC will throw light on the mysteries of the creation and structure of our universe by investigating matters at all levels, from quarks to atoms.

Since the first beam to LINAC in 2006, J-PARC has been operated by an EPICS based control system.

The TLS with an electron beam energy of 1.5 GeV and a circumference of 120 meters was completed in 1993 and [...]]]> The National Synchrotron Radiation Research Center (NSRRC) operates two synchrotron light sources, named Taiwan Light Source (TLS) and Taiwan Photon Source (TPS), which are both accessible for industrial and academic research communities.

The TLS with an electron beam energy of 1.5 GeV and a circumference of 120 meters was completed in 1993 and became the first third-generation synchrotron light source in Asia. The TPS has a 3 GeV, 518-meter circumference, low-emittance synchrotron storage ring that was completed in 2014 and opened to users in 2016. Apart from meeting much-anticipated scientific demands for high brightness and coherent X-rays, the TPS is one of few ultra-high brightness synchrotrons in the world.

The TPS control system has adopted EPICS as its framework, and is using it since 2014 to support commissioning and routine operation. Main features of the TPS control system are great expansibility, good flexibility, good integration and rich GUI display applications. To save resources for the TLS control system maintenance and development, EPICS has been adopted for newly developed and rejuvenated TLS controls subsystems. The EPICS related applications are developed continually, accompanying the existing TLS controls environment. The TLS control system allows two kinds of control environments to work together seamlessly.

FAIR [...]]]> GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung (GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research) operates a large-scale worldwide unique accelerator facility for heavy ions. Researchers from all over the world use the facility for experiments to gain new insights about the building blocks of matter and the evolution of the universe. In addition they develop new applications in medicine and technology.

FAIR — Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research
At GSI, FAIR is currently being built, an international accelerator facility for the research with antiprotons and ions which is being developed and constructed in cooperation with international partners. It is one of the world’s largest construction projects for international cutting-edge research.

Especially the nuclear and particle physics experiments currently at HADES, and in the future at FAIR: CBM, R3B and PANDA are using EPICS to control their experiment setups.

Find out more at: https://www.gsi.de/en/about_us.htm

Image: GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH, T.Middelhauve/GSI/FAIR

CSNS mainly consists of an H-linac, a proton rapid cycling synchrotron, a target station and three spectrometers. It is designed to accelerate proton beam pulses to 1.6 GeV energy at 25 Hz repetition rate, [...]]]> The China Spallation Neutron Source (CSNS), operated by the Institute of High Energy Physics (IHEP), has been built at Dongguan city in China.

CSNS mainly consists of an H-linac, a proton rapid cycling synchrotron, a target station and three spectrometers. It is designed to accelerate proton beam pulses to 1.6 GeV energy at 25 Hz repetition rate, striking a solid metal target to produce spallation neutrons. The accelerator is designed to deliver a beam power of 100 kW with the upgrade capability to 500 kW by raising the linac output energy and increasing the beam intensity.

Weighing 1,200 tons and as large as a house, STAR consists mainly of 12 subsystems. It is used to search for signatures of the form of matter that RHIC was [...]]]> The STAR detector at Brookhaven National Lab specializes in tracking the thousands of particles produced by each ion collision at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC).

Weighing 1,200 tons and as large as a house, STAR consists mainly of 12 subsystems. It is used to search for signatures of the form of matter that RHIC was designed to create: the quark-gluon plasma (QGP).

As an e+/e− collider, it consists of an electron ring and a positron ring. The two rings cross each other at the south [...]]]> BEPC-II is the upgrade project of Beijing Electron Positron Collider (BEPC), located at the Institute of High Energy Physics in Beijing. It serves both high energy physics and synchrotron radiation experiments.

As an e+/e− collider, it consists of an electron ring and a positron ring. The two rings cross each other at the south interaction point, where the detector is located. For the dedicated synchrotron radiation mode, an electron beam circulates in the ring consisting of the two outer half rings.

EPICS has been used successfully in the BEPC-II accelerator control system.

The Scientific goal of BSST is for exoplanet survey. BSST has [...]]]> The Antarctic Bright Star Survey Telescope (BSST) is an optical telescope built by University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) and Nanjing Institute of Astronomical Optics & Technology, China Academy of Science. It was installed in the Antarctic Great Wall Station in 2016.

The Scientific goal of BSST is for exoplanet survey. BSST has an aperture size of 300 mm and is equipped with a large-frame 4K*4K CCD camera to receive starlight from a 3.4◦×3.4◦ field of view.

Due to the harsh environment in the Antarctica, the control software is designed to be very stable and fully automated. A remote web interface is also designed especially for the low bandwidth, high latency satellite communication.