The gas-filled recoil separator SHANS (Spectrometer for Heavy Atom and nuclear Structure) was located at the second terminal (TR2) of the Heavy Ion Research Facility in Lanzhou (HIRFL). The separator consists of four magnets in a QDQQ configuration, where D and Q denote the dipole and quadrupole magnets respectively. Working with filled helium gas, the separator has been equipped with rotating target system, beam modulation device, multi-wire proportional counter, position sensitive silicon detection array, digital data acquisition system, etc.
The separator is an useful tool to separate and study the heavy nuclei produced in fusion reactions. Due to the average equilibrium charge states of heavy ions can be formed in rarefied gas, the evaporation residues recoiled from the target were separated in flight from the primary beam by the separator and then implanted into the focal plane detection system. Subsequently the decay properties of the products were measured in the case of low background.
The separator can be used in the synthesis of heavy and superheavy nuclei, the study on the mechanism of fusion-evaporation reaction, decay spectroscopy of exotic nuclei and radio-nuclear chemistry, etc.