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Proton scattering and collimation for the LHC and LHC luminosity upgrade
[Thesis]. Manchester, UK: The University of Manchester; 2014.
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Abstract
The Large Hadron collider (LHC) is a 7\,TeV per beam proton-proton collider.The high stored beam energy of the LHC (361.6\,MJ) requires unprecedented machine protection systems.As demonstrated in September 2008, failure of any one of these systems can lead to considerable damage, and hence delays in the physics schedule.In addition to various quench protection systems and interlocks, a beam collimation system is installed to protect against regular and irregular beam loss, with the aim of protecting against superconducting magnet quenches.The high 8.33T magnetic field of the main arc bending magnets leads to a quench when exposed to beam energy leakage of $5\,\textrm{mW cm}^{-3}$.In order to ensure accurate running of this system, computer simulations must be created.A tracking code, Merlin, has been adapted to simulate the features of the collimation system.New physics models for the simulation of protons interacting in a collimator jaw have been created, and these have been fitted to all experimental scattering data for the first time.Merlin has been used to simulate beam loss in the LHC, and a comparison of the effect of these different physics models have been made.Finally, a luminosity upgrade, the High Luminosity Large Hadron Collider is to be installed in the 2020s.Merlin has also been used to simulate the collimation system for this upgrade in order to ensure reliable future operation of this upgrade.