skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Production of high intensity {sup 48}Ca for the 88-Inch Cyclotron and other updates

Journal Article · · Review of Scientific Instruments
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4854896· OSTI ID:22253505
; ; ; ; ;  [1];  [2]
  1. Nuclear Science Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720 (United States)
  2. Mevion Medical Systems, 300 Foster St., Littleton, Massachusetts 01460 (United States)

Recently the Versatile ECR for NUclear Science (VENUS) ion source was engaged in a 60-day long campaign to deliver high intensity {sup 48}Ca{sup 11+} beam to the 88-Inch Cyclotron. As the first long term use of VENUS for multi-week heavy-element research, new methods were developed to maximize oven to target efficiency. First, the tuning parameters of VENUS for injection into the cyclotron proved to be very different than those used to tune VENUS for maximum beam output of the desired charge state immediately following its bending magnet. Second, helium with no oxygen support gas was used to maximize the efficiency. The performance of VENUS and its low temperature oven used to produce the stable requested 75 eμA of {sup 48}Ca{sup 11+} beam current was impressive. The consumption of {sup 48}Ca in VENUS using the low temperature oven was checked roughly weekly, and was found to be on average 0.27 mg/h with an ionization efficiency into the 11+ charge state of 5.0%. No degradation in performance was noted over time. In addition, with the successful operation of VENUS the 88-Inch cyclotron was able to extract a record 2 pμA of {sup 48}Ca{sup 11+}, with a VENUS output beam current of 219 eμA. The paper describes the characteristics of the VENUS tune used for maximum transport efficiency into the cyclotron as well as ongoing efforts to improve the transport efficiency from VENUS into the cyclotron. In addition, we briefly present details regarding the recent successful repair of the cryostat vacuum system.

OSTI ID:
22253505
Journal Information:
Review of Scientific Instruments, Vol. 85, Issue 2; Conference: ICIS 2011: 14. international conference on ion sources, Giardini-Naxos, Sicily (Italy), 12-16 Sep 2011; Other Information: (c) 2014 AIP Publishing LLC; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0034-6748
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English