At the "Laboratorio Nazionale del Sud" (L.N.S.) the K-800 Superconducting Cyclotron (C.S.) is under construction and by the end of 1992 it will be completed in order to work as a booster for the 15-MV Tandem. With this facility fully stripped light ions will reach 100 MeV/amu, while the heaviest ions are foreseen to get 16 MeV/amu. In order to increase both charge states and intensities, mostly for the heaviest ions, of the beams injected into the C.S. a project for a superconducting electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) ion source has been developed and it will be carried out as a joint venture between the L.N.S. and the C.E.N. of Grenoble. This source will be the first superconducting ECR source to be coupled to a superconducting cyclotron in Europe, and it is particularly suited to exploit the capabilities of our K-800 superconducting cyclotron. The source will be working at 14.5 GHz and the confinement will be performed by superconducting magnets able to give 1.3 T on the plasma chamber wall, permitting attainment of a very good confinement. The design is at a preliminary level, but the main characteristics of the source have been established. The construction is scheduled to begin in 1992 and the source is expected to be working in 1995.
