Microwave Discharge Ion Sources

This chapter describes the basic principles, design features and characteristics of microwave discharge ion sources. A suitable source for the production of intense beams for high-power accelerators must satisfy the requirements of high brightness, stability and reliability. The 2.45 GHz off-resonance microwave discharge sources are ideal devices to generate the required beams, as they produce multimilliampere beams of protons, deuterons and singly charged ions. A description of different technical designs will be given, analysing their performance, with particular attention being paid to the quality of the beam, especially in terms of its emittance.