ISOTOPE SEPARATOR AND ACCELERATOR Experimental HALLS
FOR LOW AND MEDIUM-ENERGY EXPERIMENTS
The ISAC I experimental hall contain additional infrastructure that enables the separation, and re-acceleration of isotopes for use in purely experimental physics research. Visit Featured Media for unique virtual access to facilities in this research hall.
The building infrastructure was built in two major phases between 1996 and 2004, followed by high-energy experiments which began in 2007. The three linear accelerators are engineered differently for precise operating requirements, running sequentially like the gears in a car:
The Radio Frequency Quadrupole is a first stage acceleration to approximately 2% the speed of light
The Drift Tube Linac for medium range acceleration
The Superconducting Linac for the highest energy rare isotope beams, which achieves velocities up to 20% the speed of light for higher energy experiments inside ISAC II
In total, ISAC produces a variety of approximately 70 different rare isotopes, separated according to their mass and charge, and delivered on demand to researchers. This one of a kind combination of science and engineering technology is host to nearly 20 separate experimental facilities.
Isotope
While each element has an atomic nucleus with a unique proton number, the neutron number can vary. These different ‘flavours’ of the element are called ‘isotopes.’
Linear Accelerator
A linear particle accelerator known as a linac increases the velocity of charged subatomic particles or ions by subjecting them to a series of oscillating electric potentials along a linear beamline
Superconductors
A superconductor is a material that can conduct electricity with zero resistance. Most superconducting materials must be in an extremely low energy state (very cold) to become superconductive
