Coupling gamma-ray arrays to spectrometers: The way to better exploit radioactive ion beams

The coupling of very efficient gamma-ray arrays with large acceptance (or highly selective) spectrometers in the context of radioactive beams, has pushed away the limits for the exploration of the nuclear chart and opened up new possibilities in nuclear physics studies. At GANIL the EXOGAM array (a large efficiency gamma-ray array) has been coupled to VAMOS (a large acceptance spectrometer) and to SPEG (a highly selective spectrometer) to study many different aspects of nuclear structure and reactions covering the whole nuclear chart. Indeed, this combination has been used to study neutron-rich nuclei toward 54Ca, neutron deficient tin isotopes around A = 103, heavy elements around Md and No, reaction mechanism using the borromean light He isotopes, the nuclear structure in the island of inversion around 32Mg, and many other examples in various mass regions and energy regimes. This is also the case for the very efficient large BaF2 array Chateau de Cristal which is frequently coupled to SPEG to study nuclear structure far from stability. In this paper, the various possibilities offered at GANIL with such couplings will be given. In the future, AGATA will be installed at GANIL to exploit the beams produced by the SPIRAL2 facility. Again, it is anticipated that this new generation array will be coupled to spectrometers to better exploit the future beams.