Study of nuclear structure by the measurement of the ground state properties of unstable nuclei

High-precision laser spectroscopy technique is used to determine the ground state properties of exotic nuclei by probing its electronic hyperfine structure and isotope shift. It provides a model-independent measurement of nuclear spin, magnetic moment, electric quadrupole moment and charge radii. These nuclear parameters can be used to investigate the nuclear structure evolution and the nuclear shapes. With the development of accelerators and isotope separators, exotic isotopes far from β stability became accessible experimentally, which enhanced the capability of the laser spectroscopy technique being applied in the field of nuclear physics. A brief introduction to experimental principle is given, followed by a review of several typical examples for the experimental investigations in the different regions of nuclear chart. This aims to demonstrate the contributions of ground state properties measurement by using laser spectroscopy technique to the nuclear structure study of exotic isotopes. This discussion involves several different nuclear theory models in order to interpret the exotic phenomena observed in the neutron-rich isotopes, such as halo structure, shell evolution, shape coexistence and so on. (authors)