A NEW CONCEPT OF ISOTOPE-SEPARATION USING ION-CYCLOTRON RESONANCE IN A MAGNETIC-FIELD HAVING A RADIAL COMPONENT

A new method of isotope separation is proposed. Isotopes are ionized i n a magnetic field in a solenoid and are confined axially in an electr ostatic potential well. Ions moving in a cyclotron orbit undergo a for ce which is perpendicular to both the radial magnetic field component and the velocity. Because axial oscillation takes place over the regio n where the component changes its direction, two isotopes can be separ ated in opposite directions by accelerating one of the isotopes at one extreme of the oscillation and the other at the other extreme. The ax ial motion of ions is assumed to be in phase (phase-locked). To experi mentally confirm the effect of the radial component on ion motion, we moved the center of oscillation along the axis of the solenoid from it s center to a position where both the axial and radial components vary with the coordinates, and we excited the cyclotron motion of ions. Fr om the measured shift in the signal frequency of the accelerated ions, we could estimate the amount of displacement of the center of the cyc lotron orbit as a function of the velocity of the accelerated ions. Th e condition for separation is studied by solving the equation for ion motion with two different magnetic field distributions. Computer simul ation of the ion trajectory is carried out to demonstrate the feasibil ity of the method.