Kelly Chipps, a nuclear astrophysicist at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory and an FRIB scientific user, has been appointed to the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee. She is a former chairperson of the FRIB Users Organization Executive Committee.

FRIB Experimental Systems Division Director Georg Bollen was interviewed as an expert for an article on a paper published recently in Physical Review Letters, in which physicists from Japan and South Korea describe the first successful measurement of the precise atomic mass of 19 exotic, neutron-rich isotopes.

The world’s first superconducting cyclotron will receive a new lease on life testing next-generation microchips, Michigan State University’s Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) announced last week. (Print version: Science vol. 380/issue 6641, pages 116-117)

Michigan State University (MSU) is refurbishing its K500 cyclotron—the world’s first superconducting particle accelerator—to establish a facility to test microchips, like those used in commercial spaceflight, autonomous vehicles and 5G and 6G wireless technology. MSU said the U.S. Department of Defense Test Resource Management Center and U.S. Department of Defense Missile Defense Agency have funded a $14.2 million contract. It will allow MSU to develop the chip testing facility adjacent to the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams, which officially opened in 2022 and replaced the cyclotron. A subscription to the Lansing State Journal is required to view this article.

FRIB Laboratory Director Thomas Glasmacher was interviewed on the WILS Morning Wake-Up program on WILS (1320 AM). He discussed MSU's K500 chip-testing facility for next-generation semiconductor devices that will be based at FRIB.