High Gradient Performance of an S-Band Backward Traveling Wave Accelerating Structure for Medical Hadron Therapy Accelerators

The high-gradient performance of an accelerating structure prototype for a medical proton linac is presented. The structure was designed and built using technology developed by the CLIC collaboration and the target application is the TULIP (Turning Linac for Proton therapy) proposal developed by the TERA foundation. The special feature of this design is to produce gradient of more than 50 MV /m in low-β accelerating structures (v/c=0.38). The structure was tested in an S-band test stand at CERN. During the tests, the structure reached over above 60 MV/m at 1.2 μs pulse length and breakdown rate of about 5x10⁻⁶ bpp. The results presented include ultimate performance, long term behaviour and measurements that can guide future optimization.