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At least 379 records · Page 21
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DOE OSTI2022

The LIBRA Experiment: Investigating Robust Tritium Accountancy in Molten FLiBe Exposed to a D-T Fusion Neutron Spectrum

The Liquid Immersion Blanket: Robust Accountancy (LIBRA) experiment will be a first-of-a-kind experiment to explore and develop the liquid immersion blanket (LIB) concept. The LIB is a radically simple molten–LiF-BeF2 (FLiBe)–salt tritium breeding blanket for deuterium-tritium (D-T)–fueled fusion power plants (FPPs) achieving a high tritium breeding ratio (TBR) in neutronics models. However, tritium breeding in FLiBe is inherently difficult to study experimentally. As a result, the coupled issues of FLiBe radiochemistry and tritium (T) transport are poorly understood. LIBRA approaches this challenge by simulating an FPP blanket environment using a D-T neutron generator and ≈ 1000 kg of FLiBe. LIBRA will investigate T breeding, containment, and extraction, coupled with FLiBe redox control and radiochemistry. The primary goal of LIBRA is to demonstrate robust T accountancy in blanket prototypical conditions. Here, T accountancy encompasses accurate predictions of T breeding in the FLiBe; detection and measurement of all T bred in LIBRA; and speciation of the T extracted from the FLiBe. Initial neutronics simulations of LIBRA indicate that a global TBR of ~ 1 is possible, where the TBR is defined as the number of tritons bred and extracted from FLiBe relative to the number of neutrons produced by D-T fusion reactions in the neutron generator. In this paper, we present the LIBRA concept and its scientific goals in the context of T breeding experiments. We also consider the potential impact of the LIB on the future fusion power industry, motivating further development of FLiBe-based T breeding research activities such as LIBRA.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2024

Observation of d(t,n) α Neutrons Following d(d,p)t Reactions in a Deuterium Gas Cell: An Attempt to Repeat Ruhlig’s 1938 Observation of Secondary Reactions

In order to benchmark methods used to calculate reaction-in-flight fusion reactions in inertial confinement fusion and address issues related to the first claimed observation of d(t,n)α reactions in 1938, secondary d(t,n)α reactions have been observed following d(d,p)t reactions in deuterium gas. A pulsed 200-nA, 2.2-MeV deuterium beam from the Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory FN tandem accelerator was injected into a cylindrical multiatmosphere deuterium gas target. The incident beam traversed along the target cylinder’s 3-cm symmetry axis after its passage through a Havar entrance foil. Two different Havar foil thicknesses were used to obtain 1.5- and 0.6-MeV deuteron beams entering the deuterium cell. The cylinder’s radius was 2 cm to allow for d(d,p)t tritons emitted perpendicular to the beam to range out in the deuterium gas. The neutron emission from the cell was observed via its time of flight to a liquid scintillator placed at various angles to the beam direction, at a distance of 243 cm. Pulse-shape-discrimination techniques were used to separate neutron and gamma-ray signals seen in the liquid scintillator. The observed probability of ~2 × 10 –4 for inducing secondary d(t,n)α fusion in the gas cell per d(d,p)t reaction is consistent with theoretical expectations.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2022

Coalescence, the thermal model and multi-fragmentation: the energy and volume dependence of light nuclei production in heavy ion collisions

Here, we present results of a phase space coalescence approach within the UrQMD transport and -hybrid model for a very wide range of beam energies from SIS to LHC. The coalescence model is able to qualitatively describe the whole range of experimental data with a fixed set of parameters. Some systematic deviations are observed for very low beam energies where the role of feed down from heavier nuclei and multi-fragmentation becomes relevant. The coalescence results are mostly very close to the thermal model fits. However, both the coalescence approach as well as thermal fits are struggling to simultaneously describe the triton multiplicities measured with the STAR and ALICE experiment. The double ratio of tp/d 2 , in the coalescence approach, is found to be essentially energy and centrality independent for collisions of heavy nuclei at beam energies of E lab > 10A GeV. On the other hand the clear scaling of the d/p 2 and t/p 3 ratios with the systems volume is broken for peripheral collisions, where a canonical treatment and finite size effects become more important.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Experimental validation of an integrated modelling approach to neutron emission studies at JET

An integrated modelling methodology for the calculation of realistic plasma neutron sources for the JET tokamak has been developed. The computational chain comprises TRANSP plasma transport and DRESS neutron spectrum calculations, and their coupling to the MCNP neutron transport code, bridging plasma physics and neutronics. Here, we apply the developed methodology to the analysis of neutron emission properties of deuterium and helium plasmas at JET, and validate individual modelling steps against neutron diagnostic measurements. Two types of JET discharges are modelled—baseline-like and three-ion radio-frequency scenarios—due to their diversity in plasma heating, characteristics of the induced fast ion population, and the imprint of these on neutron emission properties. The neutron emission modelling results are quantitatively compared to the total neutron yield from fission chambers, neutron emissivity profiles from the neutron camera, neutron spectra from the time-of-flight spectrometer, and neutron activation measurements. The agreement between measured and calculated quantities is found to be satisfactory for all four diagnostic systems within the estimated experimental and computational uncertainties. Additionally, the effect of neutrons not originating from the dominating D(D, n) 3 He reactions is studied through modelling of triton burnup DT neutrons, and, in mixed D- 3 He plasmas, neutrons produced in the 9 Be(D, nγ) 10 B reaction on impurities. It is found that these reactions can contribute up to several percent to the total neutron yield and dominate the neutron activation of samples. Finally, the effect of MeV-range fast ions on the neutron activation of 115 In and 27 Al samples is measured and computationally validated.

integrated modelling↗
DOE OSTI2022

Orbital stability analysis of hypothetical Earth-mass and Luna-mass moons in the Sagarmatha (HD 100777) star system

Abstract Six of the solar system planets have 150 confirmed moons (Earth—1, Mars—2, Jupiter—53, Saturn—53, Uranus—27, Neptune—14) and seven of them (Ganymede, Titan, Callisto, Io, the Moon, Europa, Triton) have masses >0.001 $M_\oplus$. However, no exomoons have yet been discovered despite the successful detection of ∼5000 exoplanets. We can infer, based on the solar system planets, that these exoplanets are capable of hosting one or more exomoons. In this paper, we study the possible existence of hypothetical Earth-mass and Luna-mass moons orbiting the Jupiter-mass planet, Laligurans (HD 100777b) in the Sagarmatha (HD 100777) star system by means of orbital stability. We apply long-term orbital integrations and the MEGNO (mean exponential growth of nearby orbits) chaos indicator to study the orbital stability of the moons and predict a phase-space region comprising periodic, chaotic, and unstable orbits. The phase spaces primarily constitute the moon's semimajor axis, which extends from the host planet's Roche radius to the Hill radius, and full range of eccentricity. Specific points are picked from three different regions of the MEGNO map and run as single-orbit integration for up to 10 billion periods of the innermost orbit. Furthermore, the lifetime and maximum eccentricity maps are generated from the direct integration to inspect the stable and unstable orbital configurations. The analyses of these maps, with the aid of time-series plots, show that both moons maintain stable orbits in the low-eccentricity regime and semimajor axis between the Roche limit and 28.4% of the Hill radius of the planet.

Gautam, Aayush (ORCID:0000000247257589)↗
DOE OSTI2020

Beam-energy dependence of the production of light nuclei in Au + Au collisions

We study in the coalescence model the collision energy dependence of (anti-)deuteron and (anti- )triton production in the most central Au+Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}} $ = 7.7, 11.5, 19.6, 27, 39, 62.4 and 200 GeV. The needed phase-space distribution of nucleons at the kinetic freeze-out is generated from a new 3D hybrid dynamical model (iEBE-MUSIC) by using a smooth crossover equation of state (EoS) without a QCD critical point. Our model calculations predict that the coalescence parameters of (anti-)deuteron (B 2 (d) and B 2 ($\bar{d}$)) decrease monotonically as the collision energy increases, and the light nuclei yield ratio N t N p /$Nd^{2}_{d}$ remains approximately a constant with respect to the collision energy. These calculated observables fail to reproduce the non-monotonic behavior of the corresponding data from the STAR Collaboration. Without including any effects of the critical point in our model, our results serve as the baseline predictions for the yields of light nuclei in the search for the possible QCD critical points from the experimental beam energy scan of heavy ion collisions.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2020

19 Ne level structure for explosive nucleosynthesis

Ne 19 is an important isotope in nuclear astrophysics due to its role in both the F 18 ( p , α ) O 15 and O 15 ( α , γ ) Ne 19 reactions in novae and Type I x-ray bursts, respectively. The energy levels of Ne 19 near the α and proton thresholds ( S α = 3529 keV, S p = 6410 keV) correspond to resonances in both of these reactions. Previous measurements to study the structure of Ne 19 have focused on both regions in an effort to constrain these reaction rates. Discrepancies in the energies, spins, and parities for levels in Ne 19 from previous measurements contribute to the reaction-rate uncertainties. Gamma rays from the depopulation of excited states in Ne 19 were measured to reduce the level-energy uncertainties and inconsistencies in previous spin-parity assignments.The F 19 ( He 3 , t ) Ne 19 reaction was used to elucidate the structure of Ne 19 levels up to E x = 6.9 MeV. The reaction products were measured using Gammasphere ORRUBA: Dual Detectors for Experimental Structure Studies—a coupling of the Oak Ridge Rutgers University Barrel Array and Gammasphere at Argonne National Laboratory. Tritons produced in the reaction were measured in coincidence with γ rays from the deexcitation of Ne 19 energy levels. Previously unobserved transitions allowed for discrepancies in the resonance properties relevant to these two reactions to be resolved. In total, 41 transitions from 21 energy levels were measured in Ne 19 , with 21 of those transitions being previously unobserved. Of particular importance, transitions from two 3 / 2 + states with energies of 6423(3) and 6441(3) keV, crucial for accurate estimations of the F 18 ( p , α ) O 15 reaction rate, were found. Energies and spin-parities of important energy levels near the proton and α thresholds were measured and some of the discrepancies in previous measurements were resolved. Overall, measurement of the two near-threshold 3 / 2 + states reduced the calculated upper limit of the F 18 ( p , α ) O 15 reaction rate by factors of 1.5–17 in the nova temperature range.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Light nuclei with semilocal momentum-space regularized chiral interactions up to third order

In this work, we present a systematic investigation of few-nucleon systems and light nuclei using the current Low Energy Nuclear Physics International Collaboration interactions comprising semilocal momentum-space regularized two- and three-nucleon forces up to third chiral order (N 2 LO). Following our earlier study utilizing the coordinate-space regularized interactions, the two low-energy constants entering the three-body force are determined from the triton binding energy and the differential cross-section minimum in elastic nucleon-deuteron scattering. Predictions are made for selected observables in elastic nucleon-deuteron scattering and in the deuteron breakup reactions, for properties of the A = 3 and A = 4 nuclei, and for spectra of p-shell nuclei up to A = 16. A comprehensive error analysis is performed including an estimation of correlated truncation uncertainties for nuclear spectra. The obtained predictions are generally found to agree with experimental data within errors. Similarly to the coordinate-space regularized chiral interactions at the same order, a systematic overbinding of heavier nuclei is observed, which sets in for A~10 and increases with A.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Electric dipole moments of three-nucleon systems in the pionless effective field theory

We calculate the electric dipole moments (EDMs) of three-nucleon systems at leading order in pionless effective field theory. The one-body contributions that arise from permanent proton and neutron EDMs and the two-body contributions that arise from charge-parity-odd nucleon-nucleon interactions are taken into account. Neglecting the Coulomb interaction, we consider the triton and 3 He, and also investigate them in the Wigner-SU(4) symmetric limit. We also calculate the electric dipole form factor and find numerically that the momentum dependence of the electric dipole form factor in the Wigner limit is, up to an overall constant (and numerical accuracy), the same as the momentum dependence of the charge form factor. Finally, we study the cutoff dependence of these observables and find that they are properly renormalized.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Inclusive breakup cross sections in reactions induced by the nuclides 6 He and 6,7 Li in the two-body cluster model

Calculations of inclusive α particle production are performed to interpret reaction experimental data induced by the two-neutron halo 6He and the isotopes 6,7 Li on different target nuclei. In this work, we have implemented the zero-range post-form DWBA to compute the elastic and nonelastic breakup cross sections. Integrated cross sections, angular distributions and spectra are presented. Projectiles are approximated as two-body clusters, namely 6 He as α+dineutron and 6 Li ( 7 Li) are interpreted as α+deuteron(triton). The São Paulo optical potential is employed in the calculation of the distorted wave functions for the incident channels, while standard phenomenological interactions are taken for the fragment-target interactions. Calculations for 6 Li and 7 Li furnish a good description of the data, while the reaction involving 6 He is found to be more complicated, where interpretation of the data must still be considered incomplete. The present analysis identifies an overall large contribution from inclusive breakup emission for all the cases studied.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Constructing chiral effective field theory around unnatural leading-order interactions

A momentum-dependent formulation based on a stationary spin-0 and isospin-1 dibaryon field is proposed to improve convergence of chiral effective field theory in the 1 S 0 channel of NN scattering. Although the two-parameter leading-order interaction appears to be unnatural, it nevertheless has the necessary features of an effective field theory. A rapid order-by-order convergence is found in 1 S 0 . As an application beyond the two-body level, the triton binding energy is studied and compared to standard chiral effective field theory with partly perturbative pions. Here, the consistency of the chiral Lagrangian for the new formulation is examined by working out the pionic radiative corrections, and consequences of nontrivial chiral-connection terms are discussed.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Study of charged-particle emission in neutron reactions on 10 B

The 10 B + n system has been studied by measuring charged particles from neutron-induced reactions in the 1 to 20 MeV energy range. Protons, deuterons, tritons, and α particles were measured at four angles using the pulsed white neutron spectrum at the Los Alamos Neutron Science Center Weapons Neutron Research facility. Differential cross sections for each species are reported. These new data are combined with literature data in an R-matrix analysis of the 11 B compound system. Furthermore, a comparison is made to the molecular and cluster states candidates observed in these reactions.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Probing for high-momentum protons in He 4 via the He 4 ( e , e ' p ) X reactions

Experimental cross sections for the $^4He(e,e'p)X$ reaction up to a missing momentum of 0.632 GeV/$c$ at $x_B=1.24$ and $Q^2$=2(GeV/$c$)$^2$ are reported. The data are compared to Relativistic Distorted Wave Impulse Approximation(RDWIA) calculations for $^4He(e,e'p)^3H$ channel. Significantly more events in the triton mass region are measured for $p_{m}$$>$0.45 GeV/$c$ than are predicted by the theoretical model, suggesting that the effects of initial-state multi-nucleon correlations are stronger than expected by the RDWIA model.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Large- N c constraints for elastic dark-matter–light-nucleus scattering in pionless effective field theory

Recent proposals for the use of light nuclei as dark-matter direct detection targets necessitate a strong theoretical understanding of the nuclear physics involved. We perform relevant calculations for dark-matter–light-nucleus scattering in a combined pionless effective field theory and large-N c expansion, where N c is the number of quark colors. Here, we include a general set of one-nucleon currents that have been used in other effective theories, as well as novel two-nucleon contact currents. First, we obtain constraints for the relative sizes of the dark-matter couplings to the one- and two-nucleon currents through the large-N c expansion. Then, we use these constraints to make predictions for the relative sizes of spin-dependent and spin-independent cross sections for dark-matter scattering off of a nucleon, a deuteron, a triton, and helium-3.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Local position-space two-nucleon potentials from leading to fourth order of chiral effective field theory

We present local, position-space chiral NN potentials through four orders of chiral effective field theory ranging from leading order (LO) to next-to-next-to-next-to-leading order (N 3 LO, fourth order) of the Δ-less version of the theory. The long-range parts of these potentials are fixed by the very accurate πN LECs as determined in the Roy-Steiner equations analysis. At the highest order (N 3 LO), the NN data below 190 MeV laboratory energy are reproduced with the respectable χ 2 /datum of 1.45. A comparison of the N 3 LO potential with the phenomenological Argonne v 18 (AV18) potential reveals substantial agreement between the two potentials in the intermediate range ruled by chiral symmetry, thus, providing a chiral underpinning for the phenomenological AV18 potential. Our chiral NN potentials may serve as a solid basis for systematic ab initio calculations of nuclear structure and reactions that allow for a comprehensive error analysis. In particular, the order by order development of the potentials will make possible a reliable determination of the truncation error at each order. Our new family of local position-space potentials differs from existing potentials of this kind by a weaker tensor force as reflected in relatively low D-state probabilities of the deuteron (P D ≲ 4.0 % for our N 3 LO potentials) and predictions for the triton binding energy above 8.00 MeV (from two-body forces alone). As a consequence, our potentials may lead to different predictions when applied to light and intermediate-mass nuclei in ab initio calculations and, potentially, help solve some of the outstanding problems in microscopic nuclear structure.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Light (anti)nuclei production in Pb-Pb collisions at s N N = 5.02 TeV

The measurement of the production of deuterons, tritons and 3 He and their antiparticles in Pb-Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$= 5.02 TeV is presented in this article. The measurements are carried out at midrapidity (|y| < 0.5) as a function of collision centrality using the ALICE detector. The p T -integrated yields, the coalescence parameters and the ratios to protons and antiprotons are reported and compared with nucleosynthesis models. The comparison of these results in different collision systems at different center-of-mass collision energies reveals a suppression of nucleus production in small systems. In the Statistical Hadronisation Model framework, this can be explained by a small correlation volume where the baryon number is conserved, as already shown in previous fluctuation analyses. However, a different size of the correlation volume is required to describe the proton yields in the same data sets. The coalescence model can describe this suppression by the fact that the wave functions of the nuclei are large and the fireball size starts to become comparable and even much smaller than the actual nucleus at low multiplicities.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Variational Monte Carlo calculations of n + H 3 scattering

A paramount goal in nuclear physics is to unify ab initio treatments of bound and unbound states. The position-space quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) methods have a long history of successful bound-state calculations in light systems but have seen minimal implementation in unbound systems. Here, we introduce a numerical method to improve the efficiency and accuracy of unbound-state calculations in QMC. As an initial application, we compute scattering observables for the smallest system available to probe three-body forces, the neutron-triton system, using variational Monte Carlo (VMC) wave functions. The method involves inferring long-range amplitudes in the wave function from integrals over the short-range region where all the particles interact. This approach using integral relations is well established in the literature; here, we develop it for the QMC framework. We validate our approach with a consistency check between short-range spectroscopic overlap functions computed from direct evaluation and from the integral relations; scattering amplitudes are long-range asymptotics of those overlaps. Comparison against published benchmark calculations using the same potential demonstrates that when applied to the current VMC wave functions, the integral method produces more accurate scattering observables than direct evaluation from the same variational wave function. However, it still differs noticeably from the exact results. Using additional interactions, we then present phase shifts and mixing parameters for the n + 3 H system. In particular, we present one of the first applications of the Norfolk family of local coordinate-space chiral potentials in unbound systems of A > 2. The Norfolk results accurately describe s-wave scattering but predict p-wave cross sections too large. Compared with previous QMC scattering calculations, the integral method avoids difficulties associated with the precise computation of energy differences and with convergence outside the interaction region, which is particularly severe in the variational calculation. Application of the integral method here paves the way for its use in Green's function Monte Carlo (GFMC) calculations. In GFMC, the wave functions are more accurate, but the high-precision convergence of their tails is slow, and there are additional difficulties in reading out amplitudes. Here, the integral methods will address both of those remaining problems.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Production of protons and light nuclei in Au +Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 3 GeV with the STAR detector

We report the systematic measurement of protons and light nuclei production in Au +Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 3 GeV by the STAR experiment at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC). The transverse momentum (𝑝 𝑇 ) spectra of protons (𝑝) , deuterons (𝑑) , tritons (𝑡) , 3 He , and 4 He have been measured from midrapidity to target rapidity for different collision centralities. We present the rapidity and centrality dependence of particle yields (𝑑⁢𝑁/𝑑⁢𝑦), average transverse momentum (⟨𝑝 𝑇 ⟩), yield ratios (𝑑/𝑝, 𝑡/𝑝, 3 He/𝑝, 4 He/𝑝), as well as the coalescence parameters (𝐵 2 ,𝐵 3 ). The 4⁢𝜋 yields for various particles are determined by utilizing the measured rapidity distributions, 𝑑⁢𝑁/𝑑⁢𝑦. Furthermore, we present the energy, centrality, and rapidity dependence of the compound yield ratios (𝑁 𝑝 ×𝑁 𝑡 /𝑁$^{2}_{d}$) and compare them with various model calculations. Furthermore, the physics implications of these results on the production mechanism of light nuclei and the QCD phase structure are discussed.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗