PROGRESS TOWARDS THE FACILITY FOR RARE ISOTOPE BEAMS

The Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) is based on a continuous-wave superconducting heavy ion linac to accelerate all the stable isotopes to above 200 MeV/u with a beam power of up to 400 kW. At an average beam power approximately two-to-three orders-of-magnitude higher than those of operating heavy-ion facilities, FRIB stands at the power frontier of the accelerator family - the first time for heavy-ion accelerators. To realize this innovative performance, superconducting RF cavities are used starting at the very low energy of 500 keV/u, and beams with multiple charge states are accelerated simultaneously. Many technological challenges specific for this linac have been tackled by the FRIB team and collaborators. Furthermore, the distinct differences from the other types of linacs at the power front must be clearly understood to make the FRIB successful. This report summarizes the technical progress made in the past years to meet these challenges.