Hydrogen isotope biogeochemistry assumed that helium-3 was the radioactive component. The work of Luis Walter Alvarez and Robert Cornog first isolated tritium and reversed Rutherford's incorrect notion. Alvarez reasoned that tritium was radioactive, but did not measure the half-life, although calculations at the time suggested over ten years. At the end of World War II, the physical chemist Willard Libby detected the residual radioactivity of a tritium sample with a Geiger counter, providing a more accurate understanding of the half-life, now accepted at 12.3 years. The discovery of hydrogen isotopes also impacted the field of physics in the 1940s, as Nuclear Magnetic Resonance
On-Line Isotope Mass Separator or to the REX accelerator for acceleration to higher energies. The facility is operated by the ISOLDE Collaboration comprising CERN and 9 European countries. One of the major experiments in ISOLDE is the Miniball-setup. An upgrade of the post-acceleration system is currently on-going, ready to produce energetic Radioactive-Ion Beams (RIBs) of up to 10 MeV per nucleon in 2018. On-Line Isotope Mass Separator The On-Line Isotope Mass Separator, also known as the ISOLDE Radioactive Ion Beam Facility, is a facility located at CERN on the PS Booster. It started operating in 1967 and was rebuilt twice with major upgrades in