Beta-decay studies using total absorption spectroscopy

Beta-decay experiments are a primary source of information for nuclear-structure studies and at the same time complementary to in-beam investigations of nuclei far from stability. Although both types of experiment are mainly based on γ-ray spectroscopy, they face different experimental problems. The so-called Pandemonium effect is a critical problem in β-decay if we are to test theoretically calculated transition probabilities. In this contribution we will present a solution to this problem using total absorption spectroscopy methods. We will also present some examples of experiments carried out with the Total Absorption Spectrometer (TAS) at GSI an describe a new device LUCRECIA recently installed at CERN.