Aperture Measurements with AC Dipole at the Large Hadron Collider

Global aperture measurements are crucial for a safe operation and to push the performance of the LHC, in particular, the knowledge of aperture at top energy allows pushing the optics to reduce the colliding beam sizes. The standard method used in the LHC commissioning requires using several bunches for one measurement and makes bunches un-usable for other activities. This paper presents first global aperture measurements performed at injection with a new method using the AC dipole. This method consists in exciting large coherent oscillations of the beam without spoiling its emittance. A gentle control of the oscillation amplitude enables re-using the beams for several measurements. These measurements are compared with aperture measurements performed using the standard method and possible benefits, for example for optics measurements, at top energy with squeezed optics, are elaborated.