The level structure of 18Ne

S. Almaraz-Calderon, W. Tan, A. Aprahamian, B. Bucher, J. Gorres, A. Roberts, A. Villano, M. Wiescher, C. Brune, Z. Heinen, T. Massey, N. Özkan, R. T. Guray, H. Mach

Research output: Contribution to journalConference articlepeer-review

Abstract

We have measured levels in 18Ne by the 16O( 3He,n) reaction at the FN tandem accelerator of University of Notre Dame in order to measure the rate of the waiting point reaction 14O(α,p) in the hot CNO cycle. This is one of the breakout reaction in the CNO cycle where the signatures are that the temperatures are high enough to bypass the beta decay of the waiting points breaking out of the hot CNO cycle by a thermonuclear runaway in some explosive environments like Novae and X-ray bursts. One of the two paths to breakout of the hot CNO cycle is the reaction chain 14O(α,p)17F(p,γ) 18Ne(α,p). The starting (α,p) reaction on the waiting point nucleus 14O proceeds through resonant states above a-decay threshold in 18Ne. The rate of this reaction is therefore very sensitive to the partial and total widths, excitation energies and spins of the resonances in 18Ne. We studied the relevant states in 18Ne using an array of liquid scintillators with time-of-flight and pulse-shape-discrimination techniques to measure the neutrons while decaying charged particles were detected by a silicon detector array. Coincidences of n-p/α were used to measure α and proton decay branching ratios. DWBA calculations were carried out to constrain the possible spins of the new states. We will include this new information in reaction network calculations to determine the impact of this breakout path on the nuclear energy generation and nucleosynthesis in explosive hydrogen burning environments.

Original languageEnglish (US)
JournalProceedings of Science
StatePublished - 2010
Event11th Symposium on Nuclei in the Cosmos, NIC 2010 - Heidelberg, Germany
Duration: Jul 19 2010Jul 23 2010

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