Monte Carlo simulations to estimate the damage potential of electron beam and tests of beam loss detector based on quartz Cherenkov radiator read out by a silicon photomultiplier on CLIC Test Facility 3(CTF3)

The Compact Linear Collider (CLIC) study is a feasibility study aiming at the development of an electron/positron linear collider with a centre of mass energy in the multi-TeV energy range. Each Linac will have a length of 21 km, which means that very high accelerating gradients (>100 MV/m) are required. To achieve the high accelerating gradients, a novel two-beam acceleration scheme, in which RF power is transferred from a high-current, low-energy drive beam to the low-current, high energy main accelerating beam is designed. A Beam Loss Monitoring (BLM) system will be designed for CLIC to meet the requirements of the accelerator complex. Its main role as part of the machine protection scheme will be to detect potentially dangerous beam instabilities and prevent subsequent injection into the main beam or drive beam decelerators. The first part of this work describes the GEANT4 Monte Carlo simulations performed to estimate the damage potential of high energy electron beams impacting a copper target. The second part was dedicated to the characterization of a beam loss detector based on quartz Cerenkov radiator read out by Silicon Photomultipliers (SiPMs) to determine its suitability as a possible technology choice for CLIC. Preliminary measurements from the installation at the CLIC Test Facility (CTF3) are described. Both the simulations and the experiments were performed at CERN as part of the CLIC BLM study.