Impact of Microwaves on the Electron Cloud and Incoherent Effects

We consider the use of microwaves for manipulating the electron cloud, describing an exploratory experiment at PEP-II as well as computer simulations of the electron cloud build up in the presence of a microwave for an LHC dipole. We then show that the incoherent effects of the electron cloud--energy loss and transverse emittance growth due to scattering off the electrons--are negligible. This suggests that the disturbance of the coherent electron motion may be another possible application of microwaves, which could prevent beam emittance growth and beam loss.