Progress on the LUNEX5 project

LUNEX5 (free electron Laser Using a New accelerator for the Exploitation of X-ray radiation of 5th generation) aims at investigating the production of short, intense, and coherent pulses in the soft X-ray region. It comprises two types of accelerators connected to a single Free Electron Laser (FEL), enabling the most advanced seeding configurations: High order Harmonic in Gas (HHG) seeding and Echo Enable Harmonic Generation (EEHG) with cryogenic in-vacuum undulators. The 400 MeV Conventional Linear Accelerator (CLA) uses superconducting (sc) cavities, compatible with a future upgrade towards high repetition rate for investigating advanced FEL schemes. It will also enable multi-user operation by splitting parts of the macropulse into several FEL lines. A 0.4 - 1 GeV Laser Wake Field Accelerator (LWFA) will also be qualified in view of FEL applications, in the single spike or seeded regime. After the Conceptual Design Report, R&D has been launched on a cryo-ready 3 m long in-vacuum undulator, a variable strong permanent magnet quadrupole, Smith-Purcell and electro-optics diagnostics. A test experiment is under preparation for validating the computed beam transport from the LWFA.