Fully Digital and White Rabbit-Synchronized Low-Level RF System for LIPAc

Abstract

The International Fusion Materials Irradiation Facility (IFMIF) is an international project to study and qualify candidate materials for the construction of a future fusion reactor. One of the objectives of the IFMIF-EVEDA (IFMIF-Engineering Validation and Engineering Design Activity) project is to build a Linear Prototype Accelerator (LIPAc) to validate the final IFMIF accelerator concept. LIPAc, which is currently under construction in Rokkasho (Japan), will generate a 9 MeV deuteron beam of 125 mA current with a 100% of duty cycle. CIEMAT (Spain) is in charge of providing the RF Power System, including the Low-Level Radio Frequency (LLRF) system.

Most of the developed LLRF systems are not completely digital, as they use analog front-ends for intermediate frequency (IF) conversion before or after digitalization. However, the LIPAc LLRF System is a fully digital system: no analog frequency conversion is performed, the radiofrequency (RF) signals are direct digitally synthesized and sampled by means of high speed DACs (Digital to Analog Converters) and ADCs (Analog to Digital Converters). This is a clear advantage in terms of flexibility, reliability, reconfigurability, cost, and response time, as all signal processing is performed in the digital domain. The other main advantage and novelty is the use of White Rabbit (WR) for timing synchronization and Master Oscillator distribution (distributed RF over WR, WR-DRF). LIPAc LLRF System is the first LLRF based on White Rabbit, and it has been designed and fabricated using the most advanced technology. This paper presents the detailed description of the LIPAc LLRF System, its advantages, performance evaluation, and verification.