Advanced Accelerator Research

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Advanced Accelerator Research Department

What we do:

The Advanced Accelerator Research Department (AARD) is dedicated to basic and applied research in accelerator science with the goals of advancing the state-of-the-art and educating accelerator scientists. Our investigations lie at the forefront of accelerator physics, and incorporate a wide variety of fields ranging from microwave engineering, plasma physics, electromagnetic theory, and ultra-fast lasers to physical optics, materials science, and nanofabrication engineering and design. AARD efforts focus on understanding and extending the limits of accelerator technology to expand capabilities in energy, luminosity, beam power, and timescale to extend the reach of discovery science. Primarily developed for High Energy Physics and Basic Energy Science, these accelerator technologies will also benefit medicine, food safety, biology, and homeland security.

Under the guidance of the SLAC/Stanford faculty, AARD cultivates an academic environment equivalent to a university research group, but with the resources of a national laboratory. This provides an excellent opportunity for students, post-docs, and visiting scientists from Stanford University and other institutions across the world to engage in ground-breaking experimental, theoretical, and computational work at the cutting edge of accelerator research.

		Dielectric Laser Acceleration Group Leader: Joel England Investigation of techniques for accelerating particles using lasers in dielectric microstructures, with acceleration gradients orders of magnitude larger than traditional accelerators.
		Advanced Microwave Technology Group Leader: Sami Tantawi Development of normal conducting accelerators and power sources, with a focus on understanding the limitations in high-gradient and high-frequency microwave structures.
		Plasma Wakefield Acceleration Group Leader: Mark Hogan Use of short, intense pulses of electrons and positrons to create waves in a plasma (ionized gas) capable of producing orders of magnitude higher accelerating gradients than traditional accelerators.