Simulating a Multi Reflective Time of Fight Device for uses in Heavy Element Chemistry Experiments

The heaviest elements on the periodic table are interesting to study for investigations of both their nuclear and chemical properties. Unfortunately, these studies can be extremely challenging as these elements need to be produced in nuclear reactions and most have very short half-lives. This means that traditional chemistry techniques cannot be used to probe their chemical behavior. However, nuclear physics techniques are now being employed for these chemistry measurements. Such experiments have already been conducted with the Berkeley Gas-Filled Separator and FIONA devices at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory 88-inch cyclotron facility. Individual ions of heavy elements are trapped and then exposed to reactive gases such that a chemical reaction could take place. Then products of that chemical reaction can be directly identified from their mass-to-charge ratio. In the future, it is believed that the addition of a Multi-Reflective Time-of-Flight device to the setup may aid these chemistry experiments, as products of the chemical reaction can be detected over a broader-mass range than what is currently possible with FIONA alone. Simulations of the device for this use have been performed. Preliminary results will be presented.