Description
The Soreq Applied Research Accelerator Facility (SARAF), under construction at Soreq Nuclear Research Center (Yavne, Israel), is a national infrastructure for applied and basic research and training in various areas of nuclear science and engineering, which will be operated as an international user facility. It is based on a medium-energy (up to 40 MeV), high-current (up to 5 mA) superconducting linear accelerator of protons and deuterons. SARAF’s cutting-edge specifications and unique liquid-metal irradiation targets make it a world-competitive source of neutrons from thermal to high energy, and radioactive nuclei from various areas of the nuclear chart.
Basic and applied scientific programs at SARAF include neutron-based material research, nuclear reactions, non-destructive testing, research, development and production of radiopharmaceuticals, and studies of exotic isotopes for nuclear structure, astrophysics and searches for physics beyond the Standard Model of elementary particles.
Due to the novelty of SARAF's accelerator and target technology, it was divided into two phases. SARAF-I had low energy (a few MeV) and high current (up to 2 mA) to test and characterize the required technologies and was used during 2010-2019 for research that utilized its exceptional beams. The full project (SARAF-II) is funded, its commissioning will take place during 2023 and it is planned to start delivering beams in 2024.