Abstract

In particle colliders, stochastic phase space cooling using microwave techniques in the GHz frequency range have been employed historically, leading to ground-breaking discoveries, as cooling increases the likelihood of observing rare physics events. One of the most important conceptual and technological advances in this area was stochastic cooling of antiprotons invented by Simon van der Meer (Nobel Prize, 1984), which was instrumental in the discovery of the W and Z Bosons at CERN in 1983 and the ‘top’ quark at Fermilab years later. Stochastic Cooling reduces the random motion of the beam particles through granular sampling and correction of the beams phase-space structure, thus bearing resemblance to a Maxwells demon. The extension of Stochastic Cooling from the microwave regime up to optical frequencies and bandwidths, samples and exploits a charged particle’s radiation reaction to affect its own phase space, leading to increases in the achievable cooling rates by three to four orders of magnitude. I will report on the recent first experimental observation of this achievement in the IOTA ring by a Fermilab team.