Enhancing the mass resolving power of FRIB's proposed high-voltage MR-ToF mass separator and spectrometer: addressing non-ideal conditions

Multi-reflection time-of-flight mass separators and spectrometers (MR-ToF MSs) are indispensable tools at radioactive ion beam (RIB) facilities. These electrostatic ion beam traps act as highly selective mass separators and high-precision mass spectrometers for rare and exotic nuclei. When well-tuned and designed to minimize higher-order flight-time aberrations, state-of-the-art MR-ToF MSs approach, and slightly exceed, mass resolving powers of $m\mathrm{/}\mathrm{\Delta }m={10}^6$. Achieving $m\mathrm{/}\mathrm{\Delta }m>3\cdot {10}^6$ would provide the ability to resolve $>90\mathrm{\%}$ of all known isomeric states with half-lives above 10~$\text{ms}$. However, the ability to mass separate in all practical setups is limited by non-ideal conditions which place such resolving powers out of reach. To this end, we present a simulated analysis of these conditions in the newly proposed high-voltage MR-ToF MS for the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB). It is expected to store ions at 30~$\text{keV}$ beam energy and increase ion throughput by two orders of magnitude compared to current devices. Existing efforts to mitigate the effects of non-ideal conditions employed for current MR-ToF devices storing ions at $<3\text{ keV}$ beam energy will already enable mass resolving powers approaching ${10}^6$ for FRIB’s high-voltage MR-ToF device. Simulations of newly proposed mitigation strategies show that even mass resolving powers approaching ${10}^7$ might become feasible.