The role of ion sources in synthesis of the super-heavy elements

Since the early 1970s, attempts to synthesize Super Heavy Elements (SHE) have been made in many laboratories around the world. One of the main requirements of these experiments is a sufficiently large dose of target irradiation, which should be increased with a decrease in the reaction cross section. In this regard, the capacities of ion sources play an important role for the successful synthesis of SHE. At the FLNR JINR, the discovery and investigation of the new region of super heavy nuclei were based on fusion reactions of ⁴⁸Ca with ²³⁸U-²⁴⁹Cf target nuclei. In these experiments, a technique for the production of metallic ⁴⁸Ca was developed. The operation mode of the ECR ion source was set to optimize the intensity of ⁴⁸Ca ions and attain maximum ionization efficiency. Because of the heaviest target for experiments on synthesis of SHE in heavy ion reactions is ²⁴⁹Cf, so further progress in the synthesis of elements with Z > 118 requires the production of intense beams of accelerated neutron enriched isotopes, such as ⁵⁰Ti, ⁵⁸Fe, and ⁶⁴Ni.