50 Years of the Radiological Research Accelerator Facility (RARAF)

Abstract

The Radiological Research Accelerator Facility (RARAF) is in its 50th year of operation. It was commissioned on April 1, 1967 as a collaboration between the Radiological Research Laboratory (RRL) of Columbia University, and members of the Medical Research Center of Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL). It was initially funded as a user facility for radiobiology and radiological physics, concentrating on monoenergetic neutrons. Facilities for irradiation with MeV light charged particles were developed in the mid-1970s. In 1980 the facility was relocated to the Nevis Laboratories of Columbia University. RARAF now has seven beam lines, each having a dedicated irradiation facility: monoenergetic neutrons, charged particle track segments, two charged particle microbeams (one electrostatically focused to <1 μm, one magnetically focused), a 4.5 keV soft X-ray microbeam, a neutron microbeam, and a facility that produces a neutron spectrum similar to that of the atomic bomb dropped at Hiroshima. Biology facilities are available on site within close proximity to the irradiation facilities, making the RARAF very user friendly.

FIG. 1

The layout of RARAF at BNL in 1972. The SH and SV Areas target stations are labeled T1H and T1V, the elevated target station in the T Area (Area 2) is T4 and the U Area (Area 3) target station is T5. The Bio Prep and X-ray rooms are between Areas 3 and 1.

FIG. 2

A view of the T Area, including the 15°, 30° and elevated 45° beam lines. The Van de Graaff is visible at the top and the beamline to the SH/SV cave is along the left side. Leon Goodman is on the platform on the right. (Courtesy of Brookhaven National Laboratory)

FIG. 3

Layout of the first (left) and second (right) floors of RARAF at Nevis Labs. Three of the beams are now bent to the right. Note the much smaller T Area and the shorter U Area beam line. The SH and SV Areas are essentially unchanged. An office and labs are on the second floor.

FIG. 4

The third-floor laboratories. There is office space on the right side of the Biology Lab. Microbeam III houses the PMM. Microbeam II and the other rooms on the right side are a half floor below the third floor.

FIG. 5

The electrostatically focused single-particle microbeam facility in the new microbeam laboratory (Microbeam II): 1. The control electronics for the multiphoton laser; 2. the microbeam stage, microscope and camera; 3. the electronics rack containing instrumentation for the microbeam.