First experiments at the Darmstadt storage-cooler ring ESR

A survey is presented of the activities taking place at the heavy-ion storage-cooler ring (ESR) in Darmstadt which has now been in service for one year. The first experiments conducted during the ring commissioning are presented. Special attention is given to the results of the electron cooling of stored bare Ne, Ar, and Kr ions. The fact that the momentum spread Δρ/ρ and emittance ε of the stored ions can be reduced to Δρ/ρ≅10-5 and ε≅0.1π mm mrad, respectively, opens the way for new and interesting experiments in fields such as precision atomic spectroscopy, nuclear reactions and the spectroscopy of radioactive nuclei. (orig.)