The Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) at Michigan State University (MSU) is a world-class research and training center, hosting the most powerful rare isotope accelerator. MSU operates FRIB as a user facility for the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science (DOE-SC), with financial support from and furthering the mission of the DOE-SC Office of Nuclear Physics. FRIB is where researchers come together to make discoveries that change the world. They study the properties and fundamental interactions of rare isotopes and nuclear astrophysics and their impact on medicine, homeland security, and industry.
FRIB advances nuclear science by improving our understanding of nuclei and their role in the universe, while also advancing accelerator systems.
In establishing and operating FRIB, capabilities were developed that transfer to other industries and applications.
FRIB hosts the world’s most powerful heavy-ion accelerator and enables discoveries in rare isotopes, nuclear astrophysics, fundamental interactions, and societal applications like medicine, security, and industry.
Learn more about upcoming events taking place at FRIB.
Accelerator Development at TRIUMF
The TRIUMF Accelerator Division maintains and operates the accelerating infrastructure at TRIUMF including the 500MeV cyclotron, ISAC warm and cold linear accelerators, ARIEL e-Linac, ISOL and meson production targets and beamlines. A major focus of the last several years has been the installation of the ARIEL project that will add two new ISOL production targets allowing three simultaneous radioactive ion beams to be delivered to ISAC experiments. TRIUMF has planned a full year shutdown of beam delivery in 2026 (SD2026) in order to be able to complete ARIEL for commissioning in 2027. In addition to ARIEL several significant upgrade projects are on-going or near completion to be ready for the expanded beam delivery in the ARIEL era. In addition to supporting on-site infrastructure TRIUMF is engaged in national and international partnerships as Canada's centre for particle accelerator research. Nationally, TRIUMF is hosting developments in THz radiation at the e-Linac and leading the design of a Compact Accelerator Based Neutron Source (PC-CANS) for the Canadian neutron community. Internationally TRIUMF is supplying crab cavity cryomodules to CERN for the Hi-Luminosity upgrade project and engaging in other collaborations on ISOL technology, remote handling, SRF and beam physics. An important part of the Accelerator Division mission is student training. Researchers from the Division co-teach an accelerator physics course once a year and mentor ~12 graduate students in cutting edge projects in SRF, beam physics and ISOL technology that leverage the established know-how and infrastructure at TRIUMF. The seminar will summarize the major development projects at TRIUMF.
HIAT2025 - the 16th International Conference on Heavy Ion Accelerator Technology
Physics of Atomic Nuclei (PAN)
PAN introduces participants to the fundamentals of the extremely small domain of atomic nuclei and its connection to the extremely large domain of astrophysics and cosmology.
The PAN @ Michigan State Experience
- Learn about research in one of the top rare-isotope laboratories in the world.
- Get introduced to the fascinating fields of astrophysics, precision measurement, and nuclear science.
- Perform your own nuclear physics experiments.
- Meet researchers who are exploring a wide array of questions.
- Discover the surprising array of career opportunities in science.
- Experience the atmosphere of college life.
- Participants in the 2024 program get free room and board on campus (if required).
FRIB at MSU is a world-class research and training center where students and researchers from all career stages and backgrounds come together to make discoveries that change the world.
External news and journal publications discussing FRIB.
One of the nation's premier research facilities located at Michigan State University is getting a multi-million dollar upgrade. Late last month, the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science approved $49.7 million for MSU's Facility for Rare Isotope Beams.
A team of scientists, including researchers from FRIB, published an article in Nature Physics on how research on neutron-rich nuclei shows that in the so-called islands of inversion, they are deformed rather than spherical in their ground states.
Scientists and engineers at the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) have reached a new milestone in isotope studies. They accelerated a high-power beam of uranium ions and delivered a record 10.4 kilowatts of continuous beam power to a target. The work is published in the journal Physical Review Accelerators and Beams.
