  The Advanced Proton Driven Plasma Wakefield Acceleration Experiment (AWAKE)
aims at studying plasma wakefield generation and electron acceleration driven
by proton bunches. It is a proof-of-principle R&D experiment at CERN and the
world's first proton driven plasma wakefield acceleration experiment. The AWAKE
experiment will be installed in the former CNGS facility and uses the 400 GeV/c
proton beam bunches from the SPS. The first experiments will focus on the
self-modulation instability of the long (r.m.s ~12 cm) proton bunch in the
plasma. These experiments are planned for the end of 2016. Later, in 2017/2018,
low energy (~15 MeV) electrons will be externally injected to sample the
wakefields and be accelerated beyond 1 GeV.
