Influence of conducting plate boundary conditions on the transverse envelope equations describing intense ion beam transport

In typical diagnostic applications, intense ion beams are intercepted by a conducting plate associated with devices used to measure beam phase-space projections. This results in the transverse space-charge field near the plate being shorted out, rendering simple envelope models with constant space-charge strength inaccurate. Here we develop corrected envelope models based on analytical calculations to account for this effect on the space-charge term of the envelope equations, thereby removing a systematic source of error in the equations and enabling more accurate comparisons with experiment. For common intense beam parameters, we find that the envelope correction occurs primarily in the envelope angles near the plate and that the effect can be large enough to degrade precision beam matching in periodic transport lattices. Results are verified with 3D self-consistent particle-in-cell simulations based on intense beam experiments associated with driver development for heavy-ion fusion.