The Israeli Center for the Development of Radiation Sources and Uses is a unique project in the country shared by Tel Aviv University and the Judea and Samaria Academic College in Ariel
Tel Aviv University announcement
Scientists and engineers of the Israel Center for the Development of Radiation Sources and Uses succeeded, for the first time in Israel, in producing maser radiation from the FEL - Free Electron Laser facility, and transferring the radiation power to the laboratories at the Radiation Users Center, located in the Center's building.
The Israeli Center for the Development of Radiation Sources and Uses is a unique project in Israel shared by Tel Aviv University and the Judea and Samaria Academic College in Ariel. The laser was developed in the last decade by a scientific consortium led by Tel Aviv University, which was established for this purpose, and includes Raphael, KMG (Hakiriya for Nuclear Research) and Ben Gurion University of the Negev.
The center is located in a dedicated, radiation-protected building, erected for this purpose on the Judea and Samaria Academic College campus in Ariel. The FEL Knowledge and Development Center is headed by Prof. Avraham Gober from the Faculty of Engineering at Tel Aviv University. The center of the scientific activity of the center in Ariel is Prof. Yosef Panhassi from the Faculty of Engineering at the Judea and Samaria Academic College. The chairman of the Steering Committee of the Knowledge Center is Prof. (Emeritus) Yuval Neman.
The FEL facility is a powerful electromagnetic radiation source, based on extracting energy from an electron beam - which is accelerated to high energies (2 million volts).
The radiation sources, at the national user center, are at the disposal of researchers and developers from universities and industry, who need strong sources of electromagnetic radiation, in the millimeter and sub-millimeter wave fields, for research and development (R&D) needs in the civilian and military-security fields.
With the acceptance of the laser and the transfer of the radiation to the user laboratories, the first phase of the activation of the National Center for Radiation Sources and Uses was successfully completed.
Today, around 50 free electron lasers based on various accelerator technologies are successfully operating in the world. The scientific and technological development of the FEL received a great impetus when an American effort was devoted to the development of powerful laser radiation, as part of the "Star Wars" program.
The Israeli FEL is based on an electrostatic electron accelerator that enables efficient extraction of the energy from the electron beam and thus enables the receipt of laser radiation at high powers and high "color purity" (coherence - a quality characteristic of lasers). Only one other FEL facility based on an electrostatic accelerator is currently operating, and that is at the University of Santa Barbara in the USA.
The Israeli Center for the Development of Radiation Sources and Uses, and the FEL as a central component of it, was determined by the Ministry of Science as one of the 9 national knowledge centers, which were established with the aim of making unique scientific infrastructures in the various fields available for joint use by the entire community of researchers and developers in Israel.
The establishment of the center and its operation rely to a large extent on the support of the Ministry of Science as well as the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Energy and National Infrastructures.
About 17 scientists and engineers from Tel Aviv University, Yehuda and Samaria Academic College, and Ben Gurion University of the Negev are engaged in the development of radiation sources and infrastructure for users at the center, and master's degree and doctoral students receive their scientific training there.
Within the framework of the center, the FEL source in the frequency range of 70-130 gigahertz with a power of 1KW will be made available to the researchers and developers from all over the country in the first stage and in the future, gradually, the powers of up to 10KW in a wider frequency range.
Users also have additional radiation sources in the frequency range of up to 1 terahertz.
The main areas in which the research and development of the applications and uses of radiation are planned are:
• Processing and development of materials (among them the development of materials for superconductivity)
• Millimeter wave communication
• Wireless energy transfer and transmission and its transfer over long distances
• Spectroscopy
• Biomedicine
• Imaging
• Remote sensing
A maser beam instead of a laser
By Alex Doron, Maariv
For the first time, a maser beam - a concentrated beam of radiation - was produced in Israel using a particle accelerator
A maser beam, a concentrated radiation beam of millimeter and sub-millimeter waves, was produced for the first time in Israel. The beam, launched four meters at a speed close to 95% of the speed of light, was produced using a particle accelerator.
The production of the maser provides scientists with a new tool for a variety of needs, such as building a remote sensing system, a kind of radar for detecting aerosols (tiny particles floating in the air), which make up toxic gases in chemical warfare and biological warfare agents. It is also possible to use the maser for research on the damage of millimeter wave radiation emitted by cell phones.
The facility that produced the Maizer beam (as opposed to a laser beam, a beam of light), was placed at the Judea and Samaria College in Ariel, with the participation of Tel Aviv and Ben Gurion Universities, the Weizmann Institute, Raphael and the Kiriya Nuclear Research Institute (KMJ), and with the support of the Ministries of Science, the security
and the infrastructure.
The particle accelerator that produced the beam - a container 14 meters long and 2 meters in diameter - was previously used for nuclear physics research at the Weizmann Institute. Only one other laboratory, at the University of California at Santa Barbara, operates a similar free electron accelerator. Only 50 laboratories in the world are currently engaged in the research of new radiation sources, a field born from the USA's "Star Wars" program.
Prof. Yossi Panahsi from Tel Aviv University, who coordinates the scientific activity at the Center for the Development of Radiation Sources at Ariel College, says that the maser beam that was produced had a frequency of 100 GHz, 50 times the frequency of a household microwave. Transistor and semiconductor technologies have not yet produced high electromagnetic radiation energies as in the maser.
One of the most exciting ideas for using a maser is sending energy over a distance. Prof. Panhassi: "When a pilot discovers that the fuel in his plane has run out, an invisible electromagnetic beam will be sent to him in a maser, which will turn into electrical energy to restart the plane's engines. The maximum distance a maser beam can be launched is over 100 km.
The Center for the Development of Radiation Sources, headed by Prof. Avraham Gober, is a unique project in Israel. The chairman of the steering committee of the center is the former Minister of Science, Prof. Yuval Na'eman.
They knew high mathematics and physics
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