The User-friendly On-line Diffusion Chamber Jaime E. Avilés Acosta August 13, 2015

Outline 1)The experiment 2)My project 3)Project progress 4)Future prospects for the On-line Diffusion Chamber (ODC) 2

The Experiment Built in 2009, the ODC is a stand-alone apparatus for radiotracer diffusion studies Designed to make measurements as fast as possible Spectrum Master X-Cooler II 3

The Experiment Spectrum Master X-Cooler II 4

Annealing Target annealed to diffuse implanted radioisotopes The Experiment Spectrum Master X-Cooler II 5

Ablation Argon gas is ionized and then accelerated with a 60 kV potential Ion gun ablates target’s surface Ejected material and implanted radioisotopes cling to tape The Experiment Spectrum Master X-Cooler II 6

Tape transport and diffusion profiling Tape moves over gamma detector Detector records intensity of radiation over time Data are used to build a diffusion profile of the radioisotope in target. The Experiment Spectrum Master 7

What’s so special about the ODC? Direct access to on-demand production of radionuclides at ISOLDE All peripherals are run only with a LabView program, automating as much as possible to save time. The Goal 8

The purpose of the ODC is to carry out studies with short-lived radioisotopes or nuclear isomers (half-lives in tens of minutes) However, the ODC was too unwieldy and complicated for visiting researchers to carry out experiments in a short period of time. The Goal 9

The purpose of the experiment is to do studies with very short- lived radioisotopes or nuclear isomers (half-lives in minutes or less) My Project Make the ODC mobile and easier to plug-in/plug-out of beam line Calibration of peripherals (ion gun, Ge detector, Faraday cup, etc.) Improve execution timing of LabView code of Virtual Instrument that controls ODC peripherals Test apparatus with stable beams and radioactive isotope beams— compare results to offline diffusion apparatus 10

Software Changes Added annotations throughout the LabView block panel (the “code”) Wrote an in-depth guide to explain how it works Removed unnecessary flat-sequence structures to enable parallel processing Faraday Cup on the ODC couldn’t extend fully due to a series of misused variables and booleans, now replaced 11

Software Changes Most of the time, the program periodically scans for output from all the peripherals and stores the data Modified the code to add a timing functionality to see if changes in the code improved execution timing Scanning time improved by an average of 161 ms Numerous other miscellaneous changes—all changes have been logged for future reference 12

Hardware Changes Assembled a new three-phase plug for the ODC’s controller rack Added two pressure gauges and two needle gauge displays Added a turbo motor pump Added a halogen LED inside the chamber Installed heavy duty wheels (no more forklifts needed!) Calibrated Faraday Cup pre-set positions and the target holder’s origin’s position (0 mm) Attached cooling fan to turbo motor pump 13

Hardware Issues Ge gamma detector spectra showed semi-sinusoidal shaped noise Tried to bias detector with different HV supplies with no luck Warmed and cooled down detector again over a 48 hour period Feedback from Ortec DSPEC Jr signal processor suggested power failure Used a HV supply with an ammeter—current wouldn’t drop despite increasing voltage The above suggests a short-circuit in detector 14

The Future of the ODC Ge gamma detector will be sent to GSI for further diagnosis and for repairs A draft of a complete user guide for the ODC will be compiled Future students will finish calibrations, tests, and improvements (with the help of new documentation, of course) A much more user-friendly ODC will allow future users to use it for studies with short-lived radioisotopes during their short stays at CERN 15

Acknowledgement My adviser, Karl Johnston Torben Molholt Haraldur “Palle” Gunnlaugsson João Guilherme The rest of the staff at The University of Michigan Indiana University Bloomington University of Saarlandes 16

Questions? Spectrum Master X-Cooler II