AMS measurement technique after 30Â years: Possibilities and limitations of low energy systems

A brief summary of the development of AMS over the last 30 years is given and major development steps for the measurement technique are described. With the appearance of compact low energy AMS systems 10 years ago, a new category of AMS instruments has been introduced. This has resulted in a boom of new AMS facilities with more than 20 installations over the last 5 years. But low energy AMS is not limited to radiocarbon only and there is a great potential for 10Be, 26Al, 129I and actinides measurements at compact AMS systems. The latest developments towards the low energy limit of AMS resulted in two new types of systems, the NEC Single Stage AMS and ETH MICADAS operating with terminal voltages of about 200 kV only. These systems have enormous impact, not only on the use of AMS in biomedical research but also on radiocarbon dating. Precision limits of radiocarbon dating will be discussed for the MICADAS type instruments.