Speaker
Description
We present a compact, ultrafast positron source design for SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory which will provide up to 100,000 e+/s at 30 Hz, with tunable energies from 1 to 5 MeV. A primary near-term application is precision-timed entangled gamma ray pair generation for next-generation PET (Positron Emission Tomography) detector development and calibration. Conventional PET detector testing relies on radioactive sources that cannot provide control over timing or event rates. By using a linac source, we will generate positron beams that, upon annihilation on a thin tungsten target, produce entangled 511 keV gamma ray pairs with precisely defined temporal structure. Beyond medical applications, we explain how this positron source enables time-gated ghost imaging of dense materials, leveraging entangled photon correlations for low signal to noise. Finally, we will discuss longer term positron applications in semiconductor development and basic material studies, highlighting the versatility of a compact positron source.
| Working group | WG6 |
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