Construction of rare-RI ring at RIKEN RI Beam Factory

An isochronous mass spectroscopy system using a newly constructed storage ring named the “rare-RI ring” is expected to be implemented at the RIKEN Nishina Center to determine the masses of short-lived rare nuclei including those in the r-process region with a relative precision of the order of 10-6 even for only one particle. In an isochronous storage ring, the mass is determined by measuring the revolution time of each nucleus. Our rare-RI ring consists of six magnetic sectors, and each sector consists of four bending magnets. To precisely optimize the isochronous conditions of the circulating particles for large acceptance, we install ten trim coils to half of the bending magnets. A fast-response and fast-charging kicker system enables selective and efficient injection of the produced rare nuclei into the ring one by one, along with facilitating efficient extraction of the circulating particles for time-of-flight measurement. Construction of the rare-RI ring was begun in the middle of the fiscal year 2012 at the RIKEN RI Beam Factory, and the ring is expected to be fully functional by 2015.