The UMass Lowell Radiation Laboratory is a unique facility which houses a 5.5-MV Van de Graaff accelerator, a 1-MW research reactor and a ~100-kilocurie Co-60 gamma-ray source within a single complex. High fluxes of gamma rays and neutrons of energies from thermal to 10 MeV are available from the reactor and 60Co irradiator. Mono-energetic protons, as well as neutrons (using a charge exchange reaction on 7Li), are available from the Van de Graaff accelerator, with a new proton micro-beam station recently commissioned.
In addition, the nuclear physics group has robust research programs at the ATLAS accelerator and CARIBU radioactive ion beam facilities at Argonne National Lab, the LANSCE facility at Los Alamos National Lab as well as the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory at Michigan State University. The group is integrally involved in national efforts for design, characterization and use of next-generation gamma-ray tracking arrays for the upcoming national Facility for Rare Isotope Beams.
The combined resources support a variety of funded research, in both fundamental and applied science.