Nuclear Theory and Science of the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams

The Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) will be a world-leading laboratory for the study of nuclear structure, reactions and astrophysics. Experiments with intense beams of rare isotopes produced at FRIB will guide us toward a comprehensive description of nuclei, elucidate the origin of the elements in the cosmos, help provide an understanding of matter in neutron stars, and establish the scientific foundation for innovative applications of nuclear science to society. FRIB will be essential for gaining access to key regions of the nuclear chart, where the measured nuclear properties will challenge established concepts, and highlight shortcomings and needed modifications to current theory. Conversely, nuclear theory will play a critical role in providing the intellectual framework for the science at FRIB, and will provide invaluable guidance to FRIB's experimental programs. This article overviews the broad scope of the FRIB theory effort, which reaches beyond the traditional fields of nuclear structure and reactions, and nuclear astrophysics, to explore exciting interdisciplinary boundaries with other areas. \keywords{Nuclear Structure and Reactions. Nuclear Astrophysics. Fundamental Interactions. High Performance Computing. Rare Isotopes. Radioactive Beams.Comment: 20 pages, 7 figure

New directions with transfer reactions

Over the last two decades transfer reactions have seen a resurgence following developments in methods to use them with exotic beams. An important step in this evolution was the ability to perform the (d,p) reaction on fission fragment beams using the inverse kinematics technique, built on the experience with light beams. There has been renewed interest in using ($^9$Be, $^8$Be) and ($^{13}$C, $^{12}$C) reactions to selectively populate single-particle like states that can be studied via their subsequent decay. These reactions have been successfully utilized in the $^{132}$Sn region. Additionally, our collaboration has recently performed experiments with GODDESS, a combination of the full ORRUBA detector and Gammasphere arrays. Another new direction is measuring neutrons from (d,n) reactions, performed in inverse kinematics, with the VANDLE array of plastic scintillators. Presented below is an overview of these new techniques and some of the early data from recent experiments.Comment: 8 pages, 3 figures, Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Fission and Properties of Neutron-rich Nuclei, Sanibel, Florid

Isotope Harvesting at Heavy-Ion Fragmentation Facilities

Isotope harvesting from heavy-ion fragmentation facilities is a potential source of isotopes of interest for applications research. With the upgrade of the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory (NSCL) to the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) usable quantities of many isotopes of interest will be produced and available for harvest from an aqueous beam dump. If available, these isotopes would be of interest to a broad range of applications such as medicine, geology, and stockpile stewardship. Preliminary experiments were performed at the NSCL in order to determine the feasibility of isotope harvesting at (FRIB). A water target station that consisted of a 100 mL beam dump was designed and built to collect secondary beams at the NSCL. This target station could be controlled remotely from outside of the experimental vault allowing for multiple collections with minimal exposure to radioactivity. Three secondary beam collections were made with the water target station: a 24Na beam, an analyzed 67Cu beam, and an unanalyzed 67Cu beam. To test the durability of the target station, a 73% pure 85 MeV/u 24Na secondary beam was stopped and collected in the beam dump. Multiple collections were made with currents up to 2 x 106 particles per second without visible radiolytic damage to the target cell. The station operated without any observed release of radiolytic gases, spills, or loss of radioactive liquids. The water target station was then used collect a 77% pure 76 MeV/u 67Cu secondary beam. 67Cu was separated from the other secondary beam contaminants with an average recovery of 88 ± 3 % and used to radiolabel an antibody. The radiochemical yield of 67Cu-NOTA-Bz-NCS-Trastuzumab was \u3e95%. To better mimic the conditions that would be present in the beam dump at FRIB an unanalyzed beam was collected. This secondary beam was 2.6% pure and contained many contaminants most of which are located in period four of the periodic table. 67Cu was separated from the beam contaminants with an average recovery of 74 ± 4% and a radiochemical purity of \u3e99%. The purified 67Cu was then used to radiolabel NOTA conjugated Panitumumab antibodies and injected into HCT-116 tumor bearing mice via tail vein injection. A five day biodistribution profile was obtained and the tumor uptake of 67Cu-NOTA-Bz-NCS-Panitumumab was measured to be 12.5 ± 0.7 % ID/g

Novel Techniques for Constraining Neutron-Capture Rates Relevant for r-Process Heavy-Element Nucleosynthesis

The rapid-neutron capture process ($r$ process) is identified as the producer of about 50\% of elements heavier than iron. This process requires an astrophysical environment with an extremely high neutron flux over a short amount of time ($\sim$ seconds), creating very neutron-rich nuclei that are subsequently transformed to stable nuclei via $\beta^-$ decay. One key ingredient to large-scale $r$-process reaction networks is radiative neutron-capture ($n,\gamma$) rates, for which there exist virtually no data for extremely neutron-rich nuclei involved in the $r$ process. Due to the current status of nuclear-reaction theory and our poor understanding of basic nuclear properties such as level densities and average $\gamma$-decay strengths, theoretically estimated ($n,\gamma$) rates may vary by orders of magnitude and represent a major source of uncertainty in any nuclear-reaction network calculation of $r$-process abundances. In this review, we discuss new approaches to provide information on neutron-capture cross sections and reaction rates relevant to the $r$ process. In particular, we focus on indirect, experimental techniques to measure radiative neutron-capture rates. While direct measurements are not available at present, but could possibly be realized in the future, the indirect approaches present a first step towards constraining neutron-capture rates of importance to the $r$ process.Comment: 62 pages, 24 figures, accepted for publication in Progress in Particle and Nuclear Physic

Feasibility of isotope harvesting at a projectile fragmentation facility: ⁶⁷Cu

The work presented here describes a proof-of-principle experiment for the chemical extraction of (67)Cu from an aqueous beam stop at the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory (NSCL). A 76 MeV/A (67)Cu beam was stopped in water, successfully isolated from the aqueous solution through a series of chemical separations involving a chelating disk and anion exchange chromatography, then bound to NOTA-conjugated Herceptin antibodies, and the bound activity was validated using instant thin-layer chromatography (ITLC). The chemical extraction efficiency was found to be 88 ± 3% and the radiochemical yield was ≥95%. These results show that extraction of radioisotopes from an aqueous projectile-fragment beam dump is a feasible method for obtaining radiochemically pure isotopes