EAPSI: Studying Exotic Nuclear Matter with a Particle Tracking Detector and Radioactive Beams

该奖项支持准备和测试一个大型探测器，用于日本RIKEN稀有同位素束设施（RIBF）即将进行的实验。 这项工作将由RIBF首席科学家Hiroyoshi Sakurai博士执行。该探测器将用于研究仅在RIBF提供的放射性束碰撞产生的奇异物质形式。在实验室中制造奇异核物质的应用范围从识别和治疗肿瘤，将废弃的放射性物质转化为更易于管理的形式，到理解物质稳定的原因。 有数百种化学元素可能会在地球上发现的之外产生。这些元素与天然丰富的元素有关，因为它们是相同元素种类的重或轻版本。通过从一种元素中增加或减少中子，我们可以创造出具有有趣核性质的奇异形式的物质。核科学界未来的目标之一是了解核物质的压力、能量和温度对核状态方程（EoS）的非对称贡献。这种不对称的贡献与成本有关，在能量方面，你必须从具有相同数量质子和中子的物质转移到不稳定的富含中子的物质时支付。EoS函数形式的最高不确定性是核密度是正常核物质的两倍。RIKEN是目前唯一一个能够获得足够高入射能量的光束，以产生达到这种密度的碰撞的地方。该项目将为即将进行的实验准备一个时间投影室（TPC）。在这个实验中，我们计划测量这些奇异碰撞中产生的轻带电粒子，从而提取有关核EoS的信息。这个NSF EAPSI奖是与日本科学促进协会合作资助的。

This award supports preparation and testing of a large detector for an upcoming experiment at the RIKEN Rare Isotope Beam Facility (RIBF) in Japan. This work will be performed with Dr. Hiroyoshi Sakurai, Chief Scientist of RIBF. The detector will be used to study exotic forms of matter produced by colliding radioactive beams only available at RIBF. Creating exotic nuclear matter in the laboratory has applications ranging from identifying and treating tumors, converting waste radioactive material into more manageable forms, to understanding the reason behind why matter is stable at all. There are hundreds of chemical elements that may be produced beyond that which can be found on earth. These elements are related to the naturally abundant elements in that they are heavy, or lighter, versions of the same element species. By adding or subtracting neutrons from an element, we can create exotic forms of matter which have interesting nuclear properties.One of the future goals in the nuclear science community is to understand the asymmetric contribution to the nuclear Equation of State (EoS) which relates pressure, energy, and temperature of nuclear matter. This asymmetric contribution is related to the cost, in energy, you must pay when moving from matter that has an equal number of protons and neutrons to unstable, neutron rich matter. The highest uncertainty of the functional form of the EoS is around nuclear densities twice that of normal nuclear matter. RIKEN is currently the only place to access beams with high enough incident energy to produce collisions reaching this density. This project will prepare a Time Projection Chamber (TPC) to be operational for an upcoming experiment. In this experiment we plan to measure the light charged particles produced in these exotic collisions thus extracting information about the nuclear EoS. This NSF EAPSI award is funded in collaboration with the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.