Masses of exotic nuclei

Yamaguchi, Takayuki*; Koura, Hiroyuki   ; Litvinov, Yu. A.*; Wang, M.*

Recent developments in precision mass spectrometry of radioactive isotopes (RI) and some selected related physics subjects are reviewed. Although the progress of RI beam facilities was enormous in the last decades and new, more powerful facilities are expected to come in operation in the coming few years, some regions on the nuclidic chart will remain unaccessible for experiments. Therefore, the properties of nuclides, in particular heavy neutron-rich nuclei, will have to be determined through theoretical calculations. It is an important quest to use the new precision masses for constraining and further developing of reliable nuclear theory. In this review article we focus on the recent experimental challenges and findings as well as on the cutting-edge experimental technologies and mass formula theories.