Present: J. Billowes, K. Blaum, Y. Blumenfeld, R. Catherall, A. Di Pietro, S. Franchoo, M. Garcia-Borge (Chairperson), A. Herlert, M. Huyse, M. Lindroos, T. Nilsson, K. Riisager, S. Siem, N. Marginean (replacing V. Zamfir)
 
Excused: L. Fraile, A. Jokinen, V. Zamfir

The meeting starts at 09.00 h

1. Introductory remarks by the chairperson

The chairperson opens the meeting and announces that L. Fraile will be the new Spanish representative to the ISCC committee. He and A. Jokinen are excused from the meeting.

A. Di Pietro informs the committee that there will be a new Italian representative in 2010 and M. Huyse adds that P. Van Duppen will soon take over as the Belgian representative.

2. Approval of the minutes of the 53rd meeting.

The minutes of the 53rd ISCC meeting are approved.

3. Technical developments and BE & EN Department news (R. Catherall/ M. Lindroos) (see overheads)

R. Catherall summarizes the work that has been carried out during this years shutdown. Work in the target area has included replacement of lighting, improvement of cameras and motorization and robot repair. At ISOLDE 400 metres of compressed air tube has been replaced by E. Barbero and M. Owen. The RFQ Cooler has been integrated into the vacuum system and scanners, wire grids and the fixed needle beam scanner are being repaired.

As well as the work completed in the ISOLDE hall, R. Catherall informs the committee of the many projects completed and on-going at REX-ISOLDE. Also, the committee is told that delivery has been taken of the first batch of the 35 targets constructed under the new contract with Alca in Italy. These new targets will give a 30% saving compared to previous models.

R. Catherall informs the committee that his section is now known as EN-STI-RBS and goes on to summarize the structure of the new accelerator departments.

The detailed planning by E. Siesling throughout the shutdown period is acknowledged especially as this had to be organized around the availability of A. Dorsival from Radiation Protection who has to multi-task in multi-areas. The committee thanks all those who have participated in the ISOLDE shutdown work.

M. Lindroos then takes over to talk about the HIE-ISOLDE project. He summarizes the present status of the three work packages:

• Energy: The proposed 3 stage installation of the HIE-LINAC is explained and then the proposed layout is presented. Input is requested from the user community to be able to fix priorities and finalise the layout. A discussion ensues about how best to gather this input from the ISOLDE users. K. Riisager suggests that, if possible,  some sort of viewing gallery should be including to allow easy visitor access to ISOLDE.
• Intensity: The Intensity work package is headed by R. Catherall. The arrival of Linac4 in 2013 will have a major impact on the ISOLDE target area. Hence development of target handling, targets and waste handling is required.  The manipulator concept design of ceiling mounted robots produced by a study by the University of Tampere is presented.
• Quality: O. Kester and G. Bollen at MSU have submitted a proposal to the DOE in collaboration with ISOLDE, TRIUMF, LLNL, MPI-K and ORNL for a project to construct one EBIT at either TRIUMF or ISOLDE. It has been suggested that TRIUMF and ISOLDE contribute funds to the project so that two identical EBITs can be constructed together from the beginning of the project. A comparison between the characteristics of the ECR, EBIS and EBIT is presented.
  The upgrade of the HRS which includes improved emmittance, multipole corrections and instrumentation will be a challenge and , in order to achieve this, much more work is required.

M. Lindroos then goes on to summarize the status of external funding for the HIE-ISOLDE project and presents the current costings. He then outlines the next steps that will be taken to move the project forward and informs the committee that E. Noah has been given a 2 year contract funded by the ESS-S training programme to work on target development at CERN.

4. Scheduling and PH Department news (A. Herlert / Y. Blumenfeld) (see overheads)

A. Herlert presents some of the exciting results obtained by experiments at ISOLDE during 2008 and then goes on to summarize the performance and problems encountered at the ISOLDE facility during last years running period.

The committee is told that during the 27 weeks of physics at ISOLDE during 2008, 31 IS experiments, out of the 46 that requested beamtime, were given shifts. A total of 318.5 RIB shifts were provided and out of the 25 target units used, 14 were UC targets and 1 was ThO.

A. Herlert then goes on to present various statistics including the shift distribution for the period from 2000 to 2008 which shows that the number of shifts per day is relatively stable during this period. The distribution of shifts between different types of physics for the period from 1998 to 2008 shows the return of biophysics to ISOLDE which is warmly welcomed by the committee.

The key resources used at ISOLDE in 2008 are then discussed:

• The targets performed very well during the 2008 run. However the waste target problem will have to be addresses if the number of UC targets used continues to increase.
• The use of RILIS went up to the operating limit of 2000 hours during 2008 and 58.9% of INTC shifts in 2008 made use of RILIS. As the requests for RILIS continue to increase the manpower problem will have to be resolved.

The performance of REX-ISOLDE during 2008 is then discussed. The committee is told that 104 RIB shifts were delivered to experiments and the new radioactive beams used for physics were ¹⁰C³⁺, ⁶¹Fe²¹⁺, ^61,62Mn^15+,21+ and ^202,204Rn⁴⁷⁺.

A. Herlert then goes on to present the accelerator schedule for 2009. Protons will be available from April 14^th and physics will start at ISOLDE on April 20^th.  Protons will stop on November 23^rd so there will be 31 weeks for physics which is 84 shifts more than in 2008.

The status of the INTC shifts is presented and a discussion follows about the large number of approved shifts still to be requested and the high number of new shifts which are going to be considered at the next INTC meeting.

Y. Blumenfeld then presents the news from the PH Department:

• The new organisation at CERN means that the new head of the PH Dept. is P. Bloch and ISOLDE is now a section (PH-SME-IS) of the SME group (Small and Medium sized Experiments) of which the group leader is M. Doser. The situation should be closely monitored to ensure that the new organizational structure does not affect the running of the ISOLDE facility.
• The same amount of funding as last year has been requested for 2009 for the ISOLDE section budget.
• The 2 year technician position to work 50% on REX and 50% on WITCH has now been published. This position will be 50% funded by Leuven and 50% by the ISOLDE collaboration.
• At the recent Fellows and Associates meeting M. Kowalska was awarded a 6 month extension to her contract and K. Flanagan, who was accepted as a fellow, will start at ISOLDE on October 1^st 2009. J. Van de Walle’s fellowship will finish at the end of September. J. Pakarinen, who has obtained a Marie-Curie fellowship, will start on September 1^st 2009 and will be working on MINIBALL.
  B. Jonson will spend a total of 6 months during 2009 and the same amount of time during 2010 at ISOLDE as a corresponding associate. The next deadline for fellow and associate applications is in mid-March.
• A. Gustafsson has been accepted as a doctoral student but has declined the offer.
• The new CERN Director General  is organizing the “Workshop on non LHC Physics” at CERN from 11-13 May 2009. A session will be held on ISOLDE where there will be presentations on theory, the present and future physics programme at ISOLDE and technical upgrades. There will also be short presentations on future experiments at ISOLDE. Members of the ISCC are encouraged to attend this workshop.
• This years ISOLDE Workshop will be held at CERN from 18-20 November.
• ISOLDE has put in a bid to host the next EURORIB conference in 2010 at a venue in Lamoura in the Jura mountains.
• An ISOLDE brochure is going to be produced and the printing costs will be shared by CERN and the ISOLDE Collaboration. It is suggested that ISCC members could assist with the translations of this brochure.

A. Herlert reminds the committee that information about the BMBF programme for German students can be found via the “Job Opportunities” link on the ISOLDE website.

5. New ISOLDE web page (A. Herlert)

The layout of the new ISOLDE  web page is presented and the committee agrees that extra manpower is required to be able to finish the project.

6. Status of reallocation of space for experiments (A. Herlert/ Y. Blumenfeld)

A. Herlert summarizes the status of space reallocation in the ISOLDE hall:

• The beam line racks for the CRIS setup have been installed.
• The first clean-up of MISTRAL is planned for February/March 2009.
• The future of ASPIC is being discussed.
• The ECR charge breeder will most likely be removed. GANIL has expressed interest in the ECR and will confirm in April.
• The beta-NMR system, which is now at CERN, will be installed in the hall extension.

7. Budget 2008 and 2009 (Y. Blumenfeld) (see overheads)

Y. Blumenfeld presents the detailed income and expenditure of the collaboration account for 2008 and the balance of the account is shown to be very healthy.

The manpower costs for 2009 are then discussed which includes the full or part salaries of the following people: D. Voulot, Witch-Rex Technician, J. Weterings, M. Seliverstov, S. Naomi, M. Fraser and B. Jonson.

8. News about potential new members (Y. Blumenfeld)

The committee is informed that Norway is about to sign the MoU but there has not yet been any news about the Portuguese funding application which would allow them to become a member ISOLDE.  Also Serbia has recently expressed an interest in becoming involved with ISOLDE.

Y. Blumenfeld tells the committee that he has met with the Slovakian representative at CERN and they are very interested in ISOLDE but are not yet ready to become a member. However there are already three Slovakian students at ISOLDE working for a period of three months.

9. News about new collaboration agreements under negotiation (Y. Blumenfeld) (see overheads)

Details of the collaboration agreements that are being negotiated with SPES, GANIL and institutes in INDIA are discussed.

10. HIE-ISOLDE (M. Lindroos)

M. Lindroos announces that the next steering committee meeting, which will include all grant holders, will take place on 12^th march 2009.

11. A.O.B

• The next ISCC meeting will be held at CERN on Monday 18^th May 2009 at 09:00.

The meeting ends at 13:10h