Enabling the Extreme Photonics Applications Centre at the Central Laser Facility

The Central Laser Facility (CLF)’s upcoming Extreme Photonics Applications Centre (EPAC) will house a powerful and state-of-the-art Petawatt laser using the facility’s proprietary DiPOLE laser technology.

EPAC’s versatile experimental areas will harness high-energy X-ray beams and beams of high-energy electrons, ions, neutrons and muons, enabling scientific and industrial researchers to explore fundamental physics questions and applications.

Thanks to the scale of this development, CLF has collaborated with experts from the Technology Department, ISIS Neutron and Muon Source and Scientific Computing to deliver across a range of areas.

Our Projects and Mechanical Engineering Group (PME) developed several bespoke mechanical systems for EPAC’s switchyard and beam propagation region.

The switchyard distributes (or switches) the facility’s laser beam into its multiple experimental areas for study.

Experts in PME developed over 20 bespoke vacuum chambers and a multitude of highly stable motorised mirror mounts to precisely divert the laser beams.

Nick Krumpa, Mechanical Engineer, shared: “The work delivered for the EPAC project demonstrates how engineers, across different sites and departments, can collaborate to deliver engineering excellence to enable ground-breaking scientific and industrial research.”

Our RAL-based Project Engineering Group (PEG) also partnered with CLF to tackle several technical challenges.

This included designing, analysing and testing safety modules that contain optical debris in an emergency, and ensuring critical, highly sensitive components are built to withstand potential damage.