STATUS AND FUTURE PERSPECTIVES OF THE HIE-ISOLDE PROJECT AT CERN

The High Intensity and Energy (HIE)-ISOLDE project aims at several important upgrades of the present ISOLDE radioactive beam facility at CERN. The main focus lies in the energy upgrade of the post-accelerated radionuclide beams from 3 MeV/u up to 10 MeV/u through the addition of superconducting cavities. This will open the possibility of many new types of experiments including transfer reactions throughout the nuclear chart. The first stage of this upgrade involves the design, construction, installation and commissioning of two high-β cryomodules downstream of REX-ISOLDE, the existing post-accelerator. Each cryomodule houses five high-β superconducting cavities and one superconducting solenoid. Prototypes of the Nb-sputtered Quarter Wave Resonators (QWRs) cavities for the new superconducting linear accelerator have been manufactured and are undergoing RF cold tests. The project also includes a design study of improved production targets to accommodate to the future increase of proton intensity delivered by the new LINAC4 proton driver. This improvement combined with the recently installed solid state lasers of the RILIS laser ion source and the radiofrequency quadrupole cooler and buncher ISCOOL will lead to an increase of the radioactive beam intensities of up to an order of magnitude. The project has been approved by CERN and its implementation started in January 2010. An overview of the project and the timeline will be given here.