Discovery and investigation of heavy neutron-rich isotopes with time-resolved Schottky spectrometry in the element range from thallium to actinium

U-238 projectile fragments have been created at the entrance of the fragment separator FRS, spatially separated in flight within 0.45 mu s and injected into the storage-cooler ring ESR at 7.9 Tm corresponding to about 70% light velocity. Accurate new mass values and lifetime information of the stored exotic nuclei in the element range from platinum to uranium have been obtained with single-particle Schottky spectrometry. In this experiment the new isotopes of (236)AC, At-224, Po-221, (222)po, and Tl-213 were discovered. The isotopes were unambiguously identified and their masses measured. In addition, the time-correlated data have provided information on the lifetime of the new nuclides. The discovery of isotopes along with accurate mass measurement has been achieved for the first time at the FRS-ESR facility. The results will contribute to the knowledge of the decay products from the r-process nuclei and enable a crucial test of the predictive power of modern nuclear mass and half-life models. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.