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PANCHO SHIVALA, VARANASI

Session: 2019-2020

Submitted By: Submitted To:

Harsh Kumar Patel Mr. Vivek Tripathi
Class: 12th Sign of internal teacher
Subject: Physics ………………………………….
Roll No:
Submission Date:
Sign of external examiner
………………………………………
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CERTIFICATE

This is to certify that Harsh Kumar Patel a student of

class XII has successfully completed the Physics project
entitled “Cyclotron” himself and under my guidance.
The progress of the project has been continuously
reported and has been in my knowledge consistently.

Signature of internal Signature of external

teacher examiner
……………………………. ……………………………
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Acknowledgement

I would like to express my special thanks of gratitude to

my physics teacher Mr. Vivek , who gave me the
golden opportunity to do this wonderful project of
physics on “Cyclotron” , who also helped me in
completing my project. I came to know about so many
new things I am really thankful to them. Secondly, I
would also like to thank my parents and friends who
helped me a lot in finalizing this project within the
limited time frame.
THANKS AGAIN TO ALL WHO HELPED ME.

Teacher’s sign
………………………
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Index
S. Topic Page No. Teacher’s sign
No. & Remark
1 Introduction 5-6
2 Definition of Cyclotron 6-7
3 Principle 7
4 Construction 7-8
5 Theory 9-10
6 Working 10-11
7 Limitation 12
8 Application 13
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CYCLOTRON

Introduction:
A cyclotron is a machine Used to accelerate charged
particles to high energies. The first cyclotron was built
by Ernest Orlando Lawrence and his graduate student,
M. Stanley Livingston, at the University of California,
Berkley, in the early 1930's.
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A cyclotron consists of two D-shaped cavities

sandwiched between two electromagnets. A radioactive
source is placed in the centre of the cyclotron and the
electromagnets are turned on. The radioactive source
emits charged particles. It just so happens that a
magnetic field can bend the path of a charged particle
so, if everything is just right, the charged particle will
circle around inside the D-shaped cavities. However,
this doesn't accelerate the particle. In order to do that,
the two D-shaped cavities have to be hooked up to a
radio wave generator. This generator gives one cavity a
positive charge and the other cavity a negative charge.
After a moment, the radio wave generator switches the
charges on the cavities. The charges keep switching
back and forth as long as the radio wave generator is on.
It is this switching of charges that accelerates the
particle.

Definition of Cyclotron:
A circular particle accelerator in which charged
subatomic particles generated at a central source are
accelerated spirally outward in a plane perpendicular to
a fixed magnetic field by an alternating electric field. A
cyclotron is capable of generating particle energies
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between a few million and several tens of millions of

electron volts.

Principle:
Cyclotron works on the principle that a charged particle
moving normal to a magnetic field experiences
magnetic Lorentz force due to which the particle moves
in a circular path.

Construction:
As shown in Fig, a cyclotron consists of the following
main parts:
1. It consists of two small, hollow, metallic half-
cylinders D1 and D2, called Dees as they are in the
shape of D.
2. They are mounted inside a vacuum chamber between
the poles of a powerful electromagnet.
3. The Dees are connected to the source of high
frequency alternating voltage of few hundred kilovolts.
4. The beam of charged particles to be accelerated is
injected into the Dees near their centre, in a plane
perpendicular to the magnetic field.
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5. The charged particles are pulled out of the Dees by a

deflecting plate (which is negatively charged) through a
window W.
6. The whole device is in high vacuum (pressure ~10-6
mm of Hg) so that the air molecules may not collide
with the charged particles.
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Theory:
The positive ion P to be accelerated is placed in
between the two Dees. If at any instant, D1 is at
negative potential and D2 is at positive potential, then
the ion gets accelerated towards D1 but since its
perpendicular to B, it describes a circular path of radius
r and Lorentz force provides the centripetal force.

Now,

Time taken to describe a semicircle is

( )

If this time is equal to the time during which D1 and D2

change their polarity, the ion gets accelerated when it
arrives in between the gaps. The electric field
accelerates the ion further. Once the ion is inside the
dee D2, it now describes a greater semicircle due to the
magnetic field. This process repels and the ion goes on
describing a circular path of greater radius and finally
acquires a high energy. The ion is further removed from
a window W. The maximum energy acquired by the ion
source is
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KEmax ( )

KEmax

The frequency of cyclotron is given by

Working:
When a positive ion of charge q and mass m is
emitted from the source, it is accelerated towards the
Dee having a negative potential at that instant of
time. Due to the normal magnetic field, the ion
experiences magnetic Lorentz force and moves in a
circular path. By the time the ion arrives at the gap
between the Dees, the polarity of the Dees gets
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reversed. Hence the particle is once again accelerated

and moves into the other Dee with a greater velocity
along a circle of greater radius. Thus the particle
moves in a spiral path of increasing radius and when
it comes near the edge, it is taken out with the help of
a deflector plate (D.P). The particle with high energy
is now allowed to hit the target T.
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Limitation:
 Cyclotron cannot accelerate uncharged particles like
neutrons.
 Cyclotron cannot accelerate electrons because of its
small mass.
 It cannot accelerate positively charged particles with
large mass due to relativistic effect.
 Only when the speed of the circulating ion is less
than 'c' the speed of light, we find the frequency of
revolution to be independent of its speed.
 At higher speeds, the mass of the ion will increase
and this changes the time period of the ion
revolution. This results in the ion lagging behind the
electric field and it eventually loses by collisions
against the walls of the Dees.
 The cyclotron is suitable for accelerating heavy
charged particles.
 It is not suited for very high kinetic energy.
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Application:

 The high energy particles produced in a cyclotron

are used to bombard nuclei and study the resulting
nuclear reactions and hence investigate nuclear
structure.
 The high energy particles are used to produce other
high energy particles, such as neutrons, by
collisions. These fast neutrons are used in atomic
reactors.
 It is used to implant ions into solids and modify
their properties or even synthesis new materials.
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