Neutron-Induced & gamma;-ray Production on Li and F

The Van de Graaff accelerator at the University of Kentucky Accelerator Laboratory was used to accelerate a pulsed- and bunched-proton beam (Δt ≈ 1 ns) that produced neutron through the p + ³H n + ³He reaction in a 3-cm long gas cell located at the end of the beamline. The resulting neutrons then scattered off samples of interest. The research focus was on the nuclei of lithium and fluorine atoms, which are important for energy-production applications- Angular distributions for gamma-ray emission from ¹⁹F (1348 and 1356 keV γ-rays) have been measured for several incident neutron energies ranging from 0.8 to 4.5 MeV. The experimental designs, calculations, detection techniques for emitted gamma rays and neutrons, and preliminary analysis of the data will be described. The resulting angular distributions, based on the a₄ coefficients, show the excitation functions measured at 125^o do not need to include the feeding factors that depend on the spin of the levels. The results from these measurements are important for determining neutron scattering cross sections for Li and F.