Physics Prospects from Accelerated Radioactive Ions at CERN

Through the advent of post-accelerated beams with REX-ISOLDE at CERN, probing nuclear properties using transfer reactions and Coulomb excitation of exotic nuclear species is now possible. REX ISOLDE currently provides beams of energy 2.2 MeV/u (soon be upgraded to 3.1 MeV/u) into the gamma-ray MINIBALL array, and other instrumentation, at the secondary target position. Examples of research topics currently addressed using REX are presented. Scheduled energy up-grades will increase the physics potential even further. The goal for the next five years will be to accelerate ions up to 5 MeV/A and higher energies. Increase of primary beam intensity will also be achieved in a phased approach, with a significant enhancement provided by the proposed Superconducting Proton Linac as the primary accelerator. (author)