Radio Frequency Fragment Separator at NSCL

A new device has been designed and built at NSCL which provides additional filtering of radioactive beams produced via projectile fragmentation. The Radio Frequency Fragment Separator (RFFS) uses the time micro structure of the beams accelerated by the cyclotrons to deflect particles according to their time-of-flight, in effect producing a phase filtering. The transverse RF (Radio Frequency) electric field of the RFFS has superior filtering performance compared to other electrostatic devices, such as Wien filters. Such filtering is critical for radioactive beams produced on the neutron-deficient side of the valley of stability, where strong contamination occurs at intermediate energies from 50 to 200 MeV/u.