Mood disorder is the leading intrinsic risk factor for suicidal ideation. Questioning any potency of mood-stabilizers, the monovalent cation lithium still holds the throne in medical psychiatric treatment. Furthermore, lithium`s anti-aggressive and suicide-preventive capacity in clinical practice is well established. But little is still known about trace lithium distribution and any associated metabolic effects in the human body. We applied a new technique (neutron-induced coincidence method "NIK") utilizing the 6Li(n,α)3H reaction for the position sensitive, 3D spatially resolved detection of lithium traces in post-mortem human brain tissue in suicide versus control. NIK allowed, for the first time in lithium research, to collect a three dimensional high resolution map of the regional trace lithium content in the non lithium-medicated human brain. The results show an anisotropic distribution of lithium, thus indicating a homeostatic regulation under physiological conditions as a remarkable link to essentiality. In contrast to suicide we could empirically prove significantly higher endogenous lithium concentrations in white compared to gray matter as a general trend in non-suicidal individuals and lower lithium concentrations in emotion-modulating regions in suicide.

The nucleosynthesis of elements beyond iron is dominated by neutron captures in the s and r processes. However, 32 stable, proton-rich isotopes cannot be formed during those processes, because they are shielded from the s-process flow and r-process beta-decay chains. These nuclei are attributed to the p and rp process. For all those processes, current research in nuclear astrophysics addresses the need for more precise reaction data involving radioactive isotopes. Depending on the particular reaction, direct or inverse kinematics, forward or time-reversed direction are investigated to determine or at least to constrain the desired reaction cross sections. The Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) will offer unique, unprecedented opportunities to investigate many of the important reactions. The high yield of radioactive isotopes, even far away from the valley of stability, allows the investigation of isotopes involved in processes as exotic as the r or rp processes.

Advancement of the CALIFA calorimeter project has reached a new milestone with the construction of the first modules of the CALIFA Demonstrator, ultimately to be integrated into the final calorimeter. Aspects and methods of detector optimisation will be discussed, along with characterisation using proton beams of 70 < E-kin < 230 MeV at the Bronowice Cyclotron Centre (CCB) in Krakow, Poland. Features such as the support structure, crystal geometry and digital electronics represent the final versions to be employed, enabling a full test of each component's performance. A study of caesium iodide quenching over the available proton energy range has been performed, to accompany a method for proton calibration scaled from the measured gamma-ray energies. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Within this paper we will present an entirely new energy reconstruction method iPhos for charged particles detected in CsI(Tl) crystals. Based on pulse shape analysis of CsI(Tl) scintillation signals [1] protons that cannot be stopped within the active detector material can be distinguished from those fully stopped. Due to a special signature of punch-through protons, they can be identified and their full energy is reconstructed from their specific energy loss. In a dedicated experiment at the Cyclotron Center Bronowice, Krakow the first proof of this method was achieved.

The R3B experiment (Reactions with Relativistic Radioactive Beams) at FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) is a versatile setup dedicated to the study of reactions induced by high-energy radioactive beams. It will provide kinematically complete measurements with high efficiency, acceptance and resolution, making possible a broad physics program with rare-isotopes. CALIFA (CALorimeter for In-Flight detection of gamma-rays and high energy charged pArticles), is a complex detector based on scintillation crystals, that will surround the target of the R3B experiment. CALIFA will act as a total absorption gamma-calorimeter and spectrometer, as well as identifier of charged particles from target residues. This versatility is its most challenging requirement, demanding a huge dynamic range, to cover from low energy gamma-rays up to 300 MeV protons. This fact, along with the high-energy of the beams determine the conceptual design of the detector, presented in this paper, together with the technical solutions proposed for its construction.

D. Cortina-Gil †1, H. Alvarez-Pol1, T. Aumann13, V. Avdeichikov4, M. Bendel7, J. Benlliure1, D. Bertini5, A. Bezbakh11, T. Bloch13, M. Böhmer7, M.J.G. Borge2, J.A. Briz2, P. Cabanelas1, E. Casarejos8, M. Carmona Gallardo2, J. Cederkäll4, L. Chulkov12, M. Dierigl7, D. Di Julio4, I. Durán1, E. Fiori10, A. Fomichev11, D. Galaviz9, M. Gascón1, R. Gernhäuser7, J. Gerl5, P. Golubev4, M. Golovkov11, D. González1, A. Gorshkov11, A. Heinz3, M. Heil5, B. Heiss7, W. Henning7, G. Ickert5, A. Ignatov13, B. Jakobsson4, H.T. Johansson3, M. Kmiecik14, Th. Kröll13, R. Krücken ‡ 7, S. Krupko11, F. Kurz7, T. Le Bleis7, B. Löher10, A. Maj14, E. Nacher2, T. Nilsson3, A. Perea2, C. Pfeffer7, N. Pietralla13, B. Pietras1, R. Reifarth6, J. Sanchez del Rio2, D. Savran10, S. Sidorchuk11, H. Simon5, L. Schnorrenberger13, O. Tengblad2, P. Teubig9, R. Thies3, J.A. Vilán8, M. von Schmid13, M. Winkel7, S. Winkler7, F. Wamers13, P. Yañez8, and M. Zieblinski14 1Universidad de Santiago de Compostela; 2Instituto Estructura de la Materia, CSIC Madrid; 3Chalmers University of Technology, Göteborg; 4Lund University; 5Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt; 6Goethe University Frankfurt am Main; 7Technische Universität München; 8Universidad de Vigo; 9Centro de Física Nuclear da Universidade de Lisboa; 10Extreme Matter Institute and Research Division, GSI; 11Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, Dubna; 12Nuclear Reseach Center, Kurchatov Institute Moscow; 13Technische Universität Darmstadt; 14Institute of Nuclear Physics PAN, Krakow, Poland

A new phoswich array, for the detection of high-energy protons and gamma rays from nuclear reactions, has been built. This new detector consists of four individual closely packed scintillator detectors, each of them made of 4cm of LaBr3(Ce) and 6cm of LaCl3(Ce) in phoswich configuration (optically coupled and with a common readout). In this paper we report on the results of a beam test performed at the Bronowice Cyclotron Centre (CCB) in Krakow, showing the response of this versatile instrument to high energy protons (70–230MeV). Furthermore, for the first time we prove that we can reconstruct the original energy of fast protons (E>200MeV) which pass through the total length of the crystal while still retaining a good energy resolution.

Well established in the field of scintillator detection, Caesium Iodide remains at the forefront of scintillators for use in modern calorimeters. Recent developments in photosensor technology have lead to the production of Large Area Avalanche Photo Diodes (LAAPDs), a huge advancement on traditional photosensors in terms of high internal gain, dynamic range, magnetic field insensitivity, high quantum efficiency and fast recovery time. The R3B physics programme has a number of requirements for its calorimeter, one of the most challenging being the dual functionality as both a calorimeter and a spectrometer. This involves the simultaneous detection of ∼300MeV protons and gamma rays ranging from 0.1 to 20MeV. This scintillator – photosensor coupling provides an excellent solution in this capacity, in part due to the near perfect match of the LAAPD quantum efficiency peak to the light output wavelength of CsI(Tl). Modern detector development is guided by use of Monte Carlo simulations to predict detector performance, nonetheless it is essential to benchmark these simulations against real data taken with prototype detector arrays. Here follows an account of the performance of two such prototypes representing different polar regions of the Barrel section of the forthcoming CALIFA calorimeter. Measurements were taken for gamma–ray energies up to 15.1MeV (Maier-Leibnitz Laboratory, Garching, Germany) and for direct irradiation with a 180MeV proton beam (The Svedberg Laboratoriet, Uppsala, Sweden). Results are discussed in light of complementary GEANT4 simulations.

A method that uses fuzzy clustering algorithms to achieve particle identification based on pulse shape analysis is presented.The fuzzy c-means clustering algorithm is used to compute mean (principal) pulse shapes induced by different particle species in an automatic and unsupervised fashion from a mixed set of data.A discrimination amplitude is proposed using these principal pulse shapes to identify the originating particle species of a detector pulse.Since this method does not make any assumptions about the specific features of the pulse shapes, it is very generic and suitable for multiple types of detectors.The method is applied to discriminate between photon-and proton-induced signals in CsI(Tl) scintillator detectors and the results are compared to the well-known integration method.

A new digital algorithm for online particle identification in CsI(Tl), called Reconstructive Particle IDentification (RPID) is reported. The concept is based on a model for the signal generation with two exponential components for the scintillation light output and an exponential response function of the preamplifier. To provide a fast algorithm which could be used online in modern FPGA-based electronics a simplified method for signal deconvolution was developed. Within a few simple processing steps the original pulse shape is modified to recover the amplitudes of the two scintillation components that determine the type of particle. Data from an experiment 12C \((p,p')\) 12C* at 21 MeV allowed to separate \(\gamma\)-rays and protons even of very low energies. We present the performance of this new algorithm concerning the \(\gamma\)-proton separation as well as the identification of protons not fully stopped within the CsI(Tl).