DRAGON minutes Tuesday 18th April 2006.
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Present: DH, LB, MT, JC, DO, PM, CV, GR, CD, JP (recorder).

1. Previous minutes.
   Accepted without corrections.

2. Business arising + hardware.
   TUDA to use DRAGON for energy measurements, DRAGON is prepared for
   this.
   DH, DO - Ion gauge has not been replaced, and spare has not been
   ordered.
   DH - New SB monitor due in June.
   JC - Should be 4 SBs in drawer in DRAGON area (status unknown?).
   DH, JP, CV, MT - FCF interlock updates, latching etc. is still
   ongoing.  Also, do we need to consider changing the cup-reading
   scales (large jumps in scale make it difficult to get continuous
   readings that are easy to follow)?
   JP - Updates to EPICS DM has not happened yet.
   DO - Microdot cable replacement for SB0?  This appeared to cause
   high noise levels during part of last 40Ca run.

3. MT - Acceptance studies.  Try to sort out some issues regarding the
   recent 12C(a,g)16O paper.  Beam-time starts on Wednesday May 3rd to
   Sunday May 7th, with 12C (not 20Ne as stated in the beam schedule).
   Monday 8th May, Keerthi will try for titanium.  Resonance under
   study is 4+ at 1070 keV/u.  Ideally want to map resonance and find
   maximum yield (this will be the priority of this running period).
   Then vary the beam energy and study transmission through separator.
   Charge states for 16O?  Hardware setup includes large pumping tubes
   (cell apertures in place are 4mm and 10mm entrance and exit), which is
   different to earliest measurements.  There will be a gas-target
   pressure limit of 4T due to IG interlock at end of pumping tubes.
   MT - Intends to spend some time coming up to speed on 12C(a,g)
   GEANT simulation.
   DH - It would also be possible to investigate how changes in gas
   pressure affect charge state distributions
   DH - Will relevant numbers be prepared prior to start of running
   (yield expectation etc)?
   DO - Will get pumps running at full speed due to heavy work load of
   pumps (big pumping tubes).
   JC - How well are the charge states of beam and recoils known for
   this resonance/energy?  LB - Our measured 16O charge-state
   distributions are same as ERNA's.

4. Student projects.
   DRAGON priorities:
   a)  Understand acceptance.  Measurements + simulations (Evan
       O'Connor), JP + MT.
   b)  Titanium charge-state distributions, CV.
   c)  Repeat 20Ne measurements to resolve discrepancies between two
       previous measurements.  Joel could work on 20Ne or 22Na, MT or
       JC.
   d)  Measure 16O charge-states at very low energies, DH.  
   e)  Charge-state distribution measurements, up to 1.8 MeV/A using
       40Ca to extend WL's thesis work (Joel), JC.
   f)  Charge-changing cross-sections (Joel).  Could make measurements
       later on in summer.
   g)  Upgrade electronics etc.

5. AOB.
   JC - Use of strong source (~MBq) for acceptance measurements?  JP -
   unknown whether useful at this time; we should obtain source
   anyways.
   DO - How about using a radioactive beam as a marker to find where
   losses are in the separator?