Browsing by Author "Brown, Adam E."
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- ItemAn Experiment Simulating the Production, Capture, and Detection of 8Li from an ICF Implosion(Houghton University, 2023-04-15) Lei, Chunsun; Hotchkiss, Andrew; Brown, Adam E.; Martin, Andrew L.; Yuly, Mark; McLean, James G.; Padalino, Stephen J.; Forrest, Chad J.; Sangster, Thomas C.; Regan, Sean P.Inertial confinement fusion (ICF) is a possible tool for measuring light-ion nuclear cross sections. One way to do this might be to trap and detect the radioactive decays of the product nuclei produced using a doped target capsule. Some of the highest yield light-ion reactions that could be studied using this technique are 6Li(t,p) 8Li and 9Be(t,α) 8Li, both of which produce 8Li . In order to simulate this method, a natural lithium film was deposited onto a tungsten substrate, which was then activated via the 7Li(d,p) 8Li reaction using the SUNY Geneseo Pelletron accelerator. A current pulse of up to 1000 A was discharged through the tungsten raising its temperature to as high as about 1500 °C in less than a few milliseconds, causing the lithium to rapidly evaporate and produce a gas of neutral lithium atoms which then travelled outward and stuck to the aluminum getter detector foil of the Short-Lived Isotope Counting System (SLICS). This phoswich detector was used to identify beta particles and count in situ the 840 ms beta decay curve for 8Li as a function of time in order to estimate the efficiency of SLICS for trapping and detecting ICF reaction products. Funded in part by a grant from the DOE through the Laboratory for Laser Energetics, and by SUNY Geneseo and Houghton University.XLI Annual Rochester Symposium for Physics Students, University of Rochester (Rochester, NY), April 15, 2023.
- ItemAn Experiment to Simulate Trapping and Detection of Radioactive Isotopes Produced in ICF Implosions(Houghton College, 2022-04-27) Christensen, Micah J.; Condie, Micah K.; Brown, Adam E.; Yuly, Mark; McLean, James G.; Padalino, Stephen J.; Forrest, Chad J.; Sangster, Thomas C.; Regan, SeanIt may be possible to measure the low energy nuclear cross sections of light ion reactions by trapping the reaction products from an Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF) implosion and detecting their beta decays. To test this idea, an “exploding wire” experiment was designed to simulate the expanding gas released in an ICF event. A copper plated tungsten foil was inserted into a vacuum chamber and activated with a deuteron beam via 65 Cu(d, p) 66 Cu. A current pulse through the tungsten then vaporized the copper to create an expanding radioactive gas, simulating the gas behavior in the ICF target chamber following the laser shot. Attempts were made to capture some gas and detect the 66 Cu beta decays using two trap designs, one using a getter and the other a turbopump. Both designs used the Short Lived Isotope Counting System (SLICS), consisting of plastic scintillator phoswich detectors and fast electronics, to identify and count the beta particles. Funded in part by a grant from the DOE through the Laboratory for Laser Energetics, and by SUNY Geneseo and Houghton College.OMEGA Laser User’s Group Meeting, Laboratory for Laser Energetics, Rochester, NY, April 27, 2022; 63rd Annual Meeting of the APS Division of Plasma Physics, Pittsburgh, PA, November 8-12, 2021; XL Annual Rochester Symposium for Physics Students, University of Rochester, April 8, 2022; 2022 Omega Laser Facility Users Group Workshop Student Poster Award
- ItemSimulating Particle Transport within a Metallic Magnetic Calorimeter to Unfold the Detector Response(Houghton University, 2023-05-10) Brown, Adam E.The measurement technique of Decay Energy Spectroscopy (DES) utilizes high-energy resolution (7.5±0.2 eV FWHM at 6539 eV) [1] low temperature microcalorimeters to measure the total energy of a decay from an embedded radioactive source. DES spectra are histograms of the total decay energy thermalized in the absorber. Some of this energy is lost, largely due to decay products escaping the absorber or energy stored in metastable states (the latter depends on source preparation and is not considered in this work). This results in a measurement of energy that is lower than the decay energy. The escape probability is not constant as a function of initial decay energy but is dependent on the absorber material and the source’s energy, type, location, and distribution—all of which form what we call the detector response. In this work, the response matrix for a microcalorimeter is built using EGSnrc—a Monte Carlo particle transport software—to simulate the energy deposition of a point source of monoenergetic beta particles ranging from 10 keV to 2 MeV. This response matrix may be used to deconvolve the detector response from a DES measurement so systematic uncertainty can be reduced. This will result in a more precisely known beta decay shape, important for fields such as nuclear medicine and testing theoretical descriptions of beta decay at low energies.
- ItemSimulating Particle Transport Within a Microcalorimeter to Unfold the Detector Response(Houghton University, 2023-05-10) Brown, Adam E.The measurement technique of Decay Energy Spectroscopy (DES) utilizes high-energy resolution (7.5±0.2 eV FWHM at 6539 eV) [1] low temperature microcalorimeters to measure the total energy of a decay from an embedded radioactive source. DES spectra are histograms of the total decay energy thermalized in the absorber. Some of this energy is lost, largely due to decay products escaping the absorber or energy stored in metastable states (the latter depends on source preparation and is not considered in this work). This results in a measurement of energy that is lower than the decay energy. The escape probability is not constant as a function of initial decay energy but is dependent on the absorber material and the source’s energy, type, location, and distribution—all of which form what we call the detector response. In this work, the response matrix for a microcalorimeter is built using EGSnrc—a Monte Carlo particle transport software—to simulate the energy deposition of a point source of monoenergetic beta particles ranging from 10 keV to 2 MeV. This response matrix may be used to deconvolve the detector response from a DES measurement so systematic uncertainty can be reduced. This will result in a more precisely known beta decay shape, important for fields such as nuclear medicine and testing theoretical descriptions of beta decay at low energies.
- ItemSimulating Particle Transport within a Microcalorimeter to Unfold the Detector Response(Houghton University, 2023-04-15) Brown, Adam E.; Koehler, Katrina E.The measurement technique of Decay Energy Spectroscopy (DES) utilizes high-energy resolution (7.5 }0.2 eV FWHM at 6539 eV) [1] low temperature microcalorimeters to measure the total energy of a decay from an embedded radioactive source. DES spectra are histograms of the total decay energy thermalized in the absorber. Some of this energy is lost, largely due to decay products escaping the absorber or energy stored in metastable states (the latter depends on source preparation and is not considered in this work). This results in a measurement of energy that is lower than the decay energy. The escape probability is not constant as a function of initial decay energy but is dependent on the absorber material and the source’s energy, type, location, and distribution—all of which form what we call the detector response. In this work, the response matrix for a microcalorimeter is built using EGSnrc—a Monte Carlo particle transport software—to simulate the energy deposition of a point source of monoenergetic beta particles ranging from 10 keV to 2 MeV. This response matrix may be used to deconvolve the detector response from a DES measurement so systematic uncertainty can be reduced. This will result in a more precisely known beta decay shape, important for fields such as nuclear medicine and testing theoretical descriptions of beta decay at low energies.XLI Annual Rochester Symposium for Physics Students, University of Rochester (Rochester, NY), April 15, 2023