Oscar Marchhart, joint PhD student at the University of Vienna and the University of Cologne, received a poster prize at the AMS-16 conference in Guilin, China for his contribution, titled "Developments towards ion cooler assisted AMS measurements of 90-Sr at CologneAMS". He is working, together with Markus Schiffer, on the development of the new ion cooler ALIS at the University of Cologne. His abstract can be read here. Congratulations Oscar!

From September 23 to September 27, our group participated in the Applied Nuclear Physics Conference (ANP) in the beautiful city of Thessaloniki, Greece. The conference covered a wide range of subjects in applied nuclear physics, with posters and talks on numerous topics. Our group contributed six talks and four posters, one of them awarded the conference poster prize (Christian Schlaier on the topic of 129/127I measurements at CologneAMS). 

Some of our scientific work will soon be published in a special conference proceeding in the Applied Radiation and Isotopes journal, more information follow soon. 

In addition to the extensive scientific program, which fostered engaging discussions and promoted new connections with international colleagues, the conference featured a diverse and enriching social program. The picture captures our group enjoying the conference lunch at the beautiful beach of Perea, following a boat trip to the beach. 

We very much enjoyed our stay in Thessaloniki with the entire group!

Our master’s student, Christian Schlaier, was awarded a poster prize at the ANP conference in Thessaloniki for his contribution titled "First ^127,129 Iodine Measurements at Cologne AMS." His research is part of the CRC1211 project, "Evolution at the Dry Limit," and focuses on studying fog patterns in the Atacama Desert, one of the driest regions on Earth. The fog contains elevated levels of the unstable rare isotope ¹²⁹I, attributed to nuclear bomb tests in the South Pacific. Using AMS (Accelerator Mass Spectrometry), Christian achieved precise measurements of extremely small isotope ratios of ^127,129 I, reaching down to the scale of 10^-13. His abstract can be read here. Great work, Christian!

In September, we published a proceeding from the Radiocarbon conference , discussing the integration of an Elemental Analyzer (EA), an Isotope Ratio Mass Spectrometer (IRMS), a Gas Injection System (GIS), and our AMS accelerator. This setup is under development by our Ph.D. student Martina Gwozdz, who also is the lead author of this paper. The setup allows us to oxidize small carbon samples with masses ranging from 10 µg to 100 µg and perform online analysis of the samples carbon content, δ¹³C, and ¹⁴C/¹²C ratios. The system offers an advancement at CologneAMS in measuring various radiocarbon dating samples for which only little sample material is available. The article can be found here.

Natasha is a PhD student from the Botswana International University of Science and Technology. She will do a practical training program in accelerator technology which is funded by the IAEA sandwich PhD fellowship.

Her study is based on exposure dating of chlorine isotopes from calcium sulfate sediments/evaporites for isotopic ratio measurements using AMS to date land surfaces that have been exposed to cosmic rays. Cosmogenic nuclide dating allows for geochronological insight and reveals information about desert histories, land denudation/soil erosion rates, and cosmic ray events. For precise isotopic ratio measurements of chlorine, suppression of its interfering isobar sulfur, which is a contaminant of the radioactive ion beam, is required. This is achieved through a) chemical means of dissolving gypsum & removing the sulfur to obtain an AgCI target and b) utilization of a laser beam collinearly so that there is element-selective photodetachment using our new ALIS setup. The IAEA sandwich PhD fellowship makes possible this new partnership of Botswana International University of Science & Technology and the University of Cologne. Welcome Natasha, great to have you on our team!