Mainz 2026 – scientific programme

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MS: Fachverband Massenspektrometrie

MS 7: Accelerator Mass Spectrometry

MS 7.3: Talk

Thursday, March 5, 2026, 15:15–15:30, N 6

First actinide performance tests at HAMSTER — •Dominik Koll, Shruti Dabke, Sebastian Fichter, Johannes Lachner, Georg Rugel, Stella Winkler, Sebastian Zwickel, and Anton Wallner — Accelerator Mass Spectrometry & Isotope Research, Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, 01328, Dresden

The newly installed Helmholtz Accelerator Mass Spectrometer Tracing Environmental Radionuclides (HAMSTER) facility at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) has been designed for actinide AMS measurements with high detection efficiency and sensitivity. These capabilities are essential for advancing environmental and nuclear astrophysics research. Plutonium was selected as the initial actinide to be tested because the sister facility VEGA at ANSTO (Australia) demonstrated that plutonium detection efficiencies approaching 1% are feasible; thereby setting the benchmark for HAMSTER.

In this contribution, we present the approach adopted for actinide AMS at HAMSTER, describe the first steps undertaken with plutonium, and discuss the main technical challenges encountered during early operation. Furthermore, we report first measurement results illustrating the current performance of the facility. An outlook on planned developments as well as upcoming scientific applications of HAMSTER, with a particular emphasis on future searches for interstellar radionuclides, will be given.

Keywords: HAMSTER; Plutonium; Actinides; AMS; HZDR