GANIL is placing France among the world’s leading research laboratories in the field of nuclear physics. Today, its ARIBE platform, an extension devoted to low energy beams, is due for modernisation aimed at multiplying the accelerator’s research capacity.

A fully integrated building

A fully integrated building The future extension of the ARIBE building was designed by the Agence Schneider, Architects and Urban Planners, based in Caen. The 150m2 construction is of traditional shape and structure. The extension has been designed to integrate the existing site, following the vertical form of the existing hall D. However, the architects were faced with the necessity to connect a number of networks (electricity, fibre optic, decarbonated water…). Delivery is scheduled for late 2009.

The world reference is located in Caen. Since 2005, the Accelerator for Interdisciplinary Research on Low Energy Ions ((ARIBE) (1), a platform within the GANIL facility(2) devoted to interdisciplinary low energy ion research (total energy less than 1 MeV), is facilitating the study of multicharged slow ion interactions with matter. “Since its creation, ARIBE, located alongside the Centre for Research on Ions, Materials and Photonics (CIMAP – CEA, CNRS, ENSICAEN, UCBN laboratory), has generated a vast array of research and innovation opportunities, from atomic physics to biology, from nanotechnology to surface treatment,” highlights Bernd Huber, the researcher in charge of ARIBE. “Today, our experimentation hall is one of the most high-performance in the world for the study ion-atom, ion-molecule, ion-surface and ion-matter interactions induced by low energy multicharged ions.
ARIBE’s four ion sources (3) are of interest to both fundamental and applied researchers in need of the different levels of energy and types of ion accessible throughout the facility. “Our beam lines are open to the entire international scientific community,” insists Laurent Maunoury, CNRS research engineer at the CIMAP and ARIBE’s technical manager. “We welcome interdisciplinary research teams studying complex systems, following validation of their project by an International Experiment Selection Committee, either GANIL/CIMAP’s own committee or the European ITSLEIF network committee.” Then, following a predefined calendar, experimenters can use ARIBE’s beams for the agreed timescale granted for their specific research.

A new building in December

In order to increase its atomic exploration capacity, GANIL is due to offer ARIBE a brand new 150m2 building. It should be operational by December. One of the rooms of this hall will be entirely devoted to hosting the future « GANIL Test Source » (GTS), due to replace the SuperShypie source, in service since 1999. “It requires such an energetic force that this new building was absolutely essential,” ensures Laurent Maunoury; “We have taken advantage of this development to create other rooms, just as essential. One of them will reunite three extremely powerful lasers, used to test the ionisation of radioactive atoms for the future SPIRAL 2 facility.” A third room will facilitate research at the target temperature of 2,000°C, which can be observed at the very heart of GANIL’s SPIRAL 1 machine.
Researchers will be able to dig deeper into the structure of atomic nuclei, aggregates and biomolecules. “We will be capable of producing nanometric (millionth of a mm) structures, which are in great demand in the field of nanotechnology, and of understanding the formation of the small organic molecules that are at the origin of life by simulating comet-solar wind collisions, via the irradiation of ice at interstellar conditions,” explains Bernd Huber. “Similarly, researchers will be able to use the GTS source to enhance their understanding of essential fundamental processes for the development of hadrontherapy (cancer treatment using ions), via the interaction of multicharged ions with biologically relevant molecules (small fragments of DNA).”
Thanks to this new facility, which will increase ion beam intensity and ion charge, physicists will be able, for example, to conduct, in just one day, an experiment that previously required 40. “Similarly, we now have the capacity to conduct new experiments, to discover rare events or to test the effects of strong particle stream,” predicts Laurent Maunoury. Hence the emergence of new research prospects, the impact of which could well lead to unexpected applications.

(1) ARIBE is part of the European Ion Technology and Spectrometry at Low Energy Ion Beam Facilities (ITSLEIF) network, managed and coordinated by Christiane Malot and Bernd Huber. Interdisciplinary research using GANIL’s ion beams is coordinated by the CIMAP (Centre for Research on Ions, Materials and Photonics) a mixed CEA/CNRS/ENSICAEN/UCBN laboratory.

(2) GANIL: National Heavy Ion Accelerator – CEA, CNRS laboratory. The facility’s key mission is to provide the international scientific community with the necessary resources to conduct fundamental research in the field of nuclear physics.

(3) A Very Low Energy Line (LTBE), 7 High Intensity Beam Lines (HIBL), an Electrospray Line and a Size-Selected Aggregates Line (LAST).

Laurent Maunoury
ARIBE CIMAP technical manager
Tél. : 02 31 45 47 87

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