Measurement and modeling of magnetic hysteresis in the LHC superconducting correctors

Abstract

The Large Hadron Collider, now under construction at CERN, relies heavily on superconducting magnets for its optics layout: besides the main magnets, almost all the correcting magnets are superconducting. Along with clear advantages, this brings about complications due to the effects of persistent currents in the superconducting filaments. Corrector magnets that trim key beam parameters or compensate field errors of the main magnets (among others those due to hysteresis), are in their turn hysteretic. In this paper we present the measured magnetic hysteresis and its possible influence on accelerator operation, with particular reference to realtime compensation of dynamic effects in the main magnets, and reproducibility issues between runs. The modeling strategy as a function of the required accuracy is discussed, and two examples are presented.