RIKEN Accelerator Research Facility (RARF)

The RARF, RIKEN Accelerator Research Facility, is the Japan-first comprehensive research center for heavy-ion science, and is open for outside users all over the world as well. The facility houses an accelerator complex composed of a K540 MeV ring cyclotron (completed in 1986) and two different injectors of a frequency-variable heavy-ion linac (completed in 1981) and a K70 MeV AVF cyclotron (completed in 1989). So far 210 MeV protons, 270 MeV polarized deuterons and twenty kinds of heavy ions ranging up to erbium with energies of 7 - 135 MeV/nucleon have been utilized for multi-disciplinary research covering nuclear physics, atomic physics, nuclear chemistry, material science and radiobiology. In this report, the current status of this accelerator complex and the attached experimental facilities after sketching out a brief history of the RIKEN cyclotrons are described. Other new ion-accelerator facilities which have recently come into operation or are nearing completion in Japan are briefly introduced as well. (author). 2 refs., 7 figs., 1 tab