Minutes from ISOLDE Physics Group meeting, 3^rd August 2016.

No comments to the minutes from the previous PG meeting: 

Please read the minutes.

Technical news:

• There will be a technical student from BI arriving to address some of the issues with the ISOLDE wire grids.
• There will be no protons for 2 hours Thursday morning, due to an intervention on Linac 2. 
• The HIE-ISOLDE schedule is now on the web: http://isolde.web.cern.ch/isolde-schedule

ISOLDE:     

• HRS:
  
  • Delivered Cd-beams to ISOLTRAP
  • The RFQ had to be turned completely off due to beam contamination.  
    • Turning off the RFQ gave lower yields (transmission about 20-30%), but a cleaner beam.
  • After yield tests with protons on converter both the line and target voltage dropped due to vacuum glitches twice. Target and line also dropped with protons on target.
    • To solve this, protons were changed from NORMHRS to STAGISO.
    • This last minute change of protons led to some issues with the correct setup and timing. On top of this the VISTAR was displaying wrong information and TIMBER was not logging the data.
    • In the future more time will be needed to develop the STAGISO setup
  • ISOLTRAP started taking protons Thursday until Monday morning and slowly increased the number of protons.
    • The target and line dropped 2 times during the run.
  • The Magnet cycled to the wrong mass.
    • The power supplies had to be restarted to cure this issue.
  • A more precise voltage divider has now been installed on the RFQ for the COLLAPS run with Al.
• GPS:
  
  • Was running Hg collections until Wednesday.
    • The run was smooth and with good yields.
• RILIS:
  
  • Was running Cd for ISOLTRAP.
  • They are now setting up for Al.
  • A faster beam gate has been installed on the HRS to allow 10 kHz switching.

• REX/HIE:
  
  • The 9-gap is now operational and the interlocks have been updated.
  • Cryo-module 2 is being re-aligned.
    • The module has a small leak so this process is very delicate.

• Target:
  
  • The cause of the vacuum glitches, which also occurred during off-line testing was found to be related to the burning of kapton insulation.
    • A new design is under investigation and will be used in the future.
  • The target #579 for Al (RILIS) run has been installed.
  • The fabrication of nano-UC has started and will be ready in about 2 weeks time.

Physics:

• ISOLTRAP:          
  
  • They were taking Cd beam – studying 127 to 132.
  • The goal was to re-measure some cases from 2014 in a more precise way (10^-9 precision).
  • Concentrated on getting results from the newly-added PI-ICR  technique. Unfortunately, due to problems both experimentally and technically (especially with the tripping of the target early in the run) the physics goal of studying 131- and 132-Cd wasn’t possible.  In addition the new detection system still needs to be understood in more detail, nonetheless useful data were in the end obtained.

 COLLAPS:

• They will take Al-beam and want to measure the charge radii (ground state and exited state) and focus on 26-Al.
• They also want to go as neutron rich as possible 32-33-Al.
• There will be 26-Na contamination in the beam, the degree of contamination needs to be understood before the 26-Al can be studied  

Safety:

• INSPECTIONS:
  
  • There was an inspection of the labs and upstairs in 508.
    • All looked more or less ok no major issues to address.
    • The LASER labs will have to be inspected again when people are back from holiday.

AOB:

• ISOLDE access Training:
  
  • Please register 2 weeks (ASAP) in advance.  
• Summer students
  
  • The summer student presentations of 10 min will soon begin. There will be max 3 presentations after the ISOLDE PG meeting.

Minutes taken by ~TEM