Oliver Kester

Duties and responsibilities of the accelerator division

The accelerator division of GSI is responsible for operation, maintenance and development of the existing accelerator systems at GSI. Furthermore the division takes a leading part in design and construction of the FAIR accelerator systems and the related technical supervision. The commissioning of the accelerators of external radiotherapy projects (heavy ion therapy facilities at university hospitals in Heidelberg (HIT) and Pavia (CNAO), radiotherapy project in Marburg) was significantly supported by the accelerator division. For HIT, the development, the realisation and the contract placing was carried out by departments of the accelerator division.

The GSI accelerator systems consist mainly of the UNILAC and the ion sources, the SIS18 and the ESR with the corresponding beamlines to the experimental caves. The developing activities on the GSI systems include maintenance and repair of the accelerator sections as well as contributions to several projects like HITRAP and new experimental domains for material research. Another task is the development of the systems for the requirements of FAIR, especially high current development for UNILAC and SIS18.

The accelerator division comprises 12 departments (LINK), which cover the machine sectors and the operating as well as the accelerator systems like vacuum technology, magnet technology, beam diagnostics, electronics, HF and electrotechnology. All departments participate in the construction and the preparation of operating the FAIR accelerators. The accelerator relevant activities for FAIR are performed in mutual endeavour with FAIR GmbH.

Divisional head and staff

Prof. Dr. Oliver Kester took the lead of the accelerator division on December 1st 2010. He succeeded Dr. Hartmut Eickhoff, who assumed new duties as Technical Manager since beginning of 2010. Mr. Kester is also professor at the Institute of Applied Physics of Goethe University in Frankfurt. He is supported by the staff members Ludwig Dahl, Winfried Barth, Peter Spiller, Udo Weinrich, Peter Busch, Markus Steck and Christina Dimopoulou and the secretaries Heidi Martinez, Paola Karampougiouki and Erika Ditter.