A study of new source/extractor configurations in liquid metal ion sources (LMIS) will be made. Initial experiments have shown that one can gain an increase by a factor of 300 in total ion beam current emitted if one uses a sharply pointed needle for the extractor in a LMIS (consisting of CU3P metal alloy) when compared to a plane extractor geometry containing a circular hole as used in all previous LMIS. The study will include use of different materials for source/extractor tips, source brightness measurements, source stability and reliability, energy spread determination, different source/extractor geometry as well as lifetime studies. Research is designed to arrive at some understanding of the physics of operation of this new ion source configuration.
