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Plasma accelerators are emerging as formidable and innovative technology for the creation of table-top devices thanks to the possibility to sustain several GV/m accelerating gradients. Recently the research activity of the SPARC_LAB collaboration has been mainly devoted to heightening and stabilize the energy gain of a beam-driven plasma wakefield accelerator. Beside the upgrade of the SPARC facility in the framework of the SABINA project, a new working point has been set up with a comb beam consisting of higher beam charges, i.e. a 500~pC driver followed by a 50~pC trailing bunch. A maximum accelerating gradient of the order of 1.2 GV/m have been measured, a factor four with respect to previous results obtained with the SPARC RF injector. This result represents a fundamental achievement for the forthcoming EuPRAXIA@SPARC_LAB plasma-based user facility, whose operation relies on similar beam dynamics concepts.
The paper reports on the experimental results obtained at SPARC and on numerical studies to enable a stable, reliable and reproducible plasma based accelerator with outstanding beam quality for the EuPRAXIA@SPARC_LAB facility.
