High-intensity electron linacs have severe space-charge effects that lead to the production of beam halo which degrade the beam quality. For a given charge per bunch, hollow beams have a weaker nonlinear space-charge force. In this paper, we have investigated the possibility of using hollow beam to control halo growth in linacs. We simulate the dynamics of such a beam in a 17 MeV radio frequency linac using ASTRA beam dynamics code and show that it experiences a smaller emittance growth as well as reduced beam halo. The results suggest that using a hollow beam, high charge per bunch could be propagated and accelerated in a radio frequency linac.
