A digital self excited loop for accelerating cavity field control

We have developed a digital process that emulates an analog oscillator and ultimately a self excited loop (SEL) for field control. The SEL, in its analog form, has been used for many years for accelerating cavity field control. In essence the SEL uses the cavity as a resonant circuit - much like a resonant (tank) circuit is used to build an oscillator. An oscillating resonant circuit can be forced to oscillate at different, but close, frequencies to resonance by applying a phase shift in the feedback path. This allows the circuit to be phased-locked to a master reference, which is crucial for multiple cavity accelerators. For phase and amplitude control the SEL must be forced to the master reference frequency, and feedback provided for in both dimensions. The novelty of this design is in the way digital signal processing (DSP) is structured to emulate an analog system. While the digital signal processing elements are not new, to our knowledge this is the first time that the digital SEL concept has been designed and demonstrated. This paper reports on the progress of the design and implementation of the digital SEL for field control of superconducting accelerating cavities.