The case for a Radio-Frequency Kicker (RF-K) for the study of exotic nuclei at FRIB

The FRIB facility will have both fast and re-accelerated beam operations. The fast beam operation proceeds via 3 logical steps: 1. Stable nuclei (something that can be dug up out of the ground) are accelerated to a significant fraction of the speed of light. 2. A beam of these primary species is directed to a primary target and (ideally) one of the reaction products is separated from the rest of the products by an electromagnetic separator system. The nuclei that compose this (secondary) beam must have lifetimes sufficiently long to make it through the separator system. Nuclei only unstable with respect to the weak interaction satisfy this condition but so do heavy quasi-bound nuclei where the protons are kinetically trapped behind a substantial Coulomb barrier. 3. In the final step the secondary beam is directed to a second target where the products of a second reaction are studied by some experimenter-supplied apparatus. The FRIB planned separator system is suitable for most projects but is inadequate for a rather large set of projects aimed at the study of the most p-rich nuclei. This deficiency has been long appreciated and floor space was left open for a device of the type discussed here – a Radio-Frequency Kicker (RF-k). This talk will review the science arguments, provide a technical overview and describe our path to having this instrument available when FRIB starts operation.