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Physical Society ColloquiumVery accurate mass measurements of exotic nuclides for nuclear physics and beyondFrank HerfurthGSI DarmstadtThe mass is one of the gross properties of a nucleus. The mass, explored for a large number of exotic nuclei, helps the understanding of the nucleus considerably by revealing weaknesses in nuclear models, by uncovering nuclear fine structure effects as well as shell closures. If only known precise enough, nuclear masses are also relevant for other fields of modern physics, as for instance the search for physics beyond the standard model. This is because the weak force manifests itself in nuclear physics through nuclear beta decay and hence a nucleus is an easy-to-access laboratory for investigation of the weak interaction.Direct mass measurement techniques that are based on a frequency determination yield today relative uncertainties as small as 10 pbb and are applicable to nuclides with half-lives as short as 50 ms. Hence, even very exotic nuclei can be investigated with very high precision. The techniques will be presented and recent measurements will be discussed.
Friday, September 5th 2003, 15:30
Ernest Rutherford Physics Building, Keys Auditorium (room 112) |