Browsing by Author "Coats, Micah"
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- ItemA Phoswich Detector System to Measure Sub-Second Half-Lives using ICF Reactions(Houghton College, 2017-10-23) Coats, Micah; Cook, Katelyn; Yuly, Mark; Padalino, Stephen; Sangster, Craig; Regan, SeanThe 3H(t,γ)6He cross section has not been measured at any bombarding energy due to the difficulties of simultaneously producing both a tritium beam and target at accelerator labs. An alternative technique may be to use an ICF tt implosion at the OMEGA Laser Facility. The 3H(t,γ)6He cross section could be determined in situ by measuring the beta decay of 6He beginning a few milliseconds after the shot along with other ICF diagnostics. A dE-E phoswich system capable of surviving in the OMEGA target chamber was tested using the SUNY Geneseo pelletron to create neutrons via 2H(d,n)3He and subsequently 6He via 9Be(n,α)6He in a beryllium target. The phoswich dE-E detector system was used to select beta decay events and measure the 807 ms halflife of 6He. It is composed of a thin, 2 ns decay time dE scintillator optically coupled to a thick, 285 ns E scintillator, with a linear gate to separate the short dE pulse from the longer E tail. Funded in part by a grant from the DOE through the Laboratory for Laser Energetics.Omega Laser User’s Group Meeting, Laboratory for Laser Energetics, Rochester, NY, April 25, 2018; XXXVII Annual Rochester Symposium for Physics Students, SUNY Brockport, Brockport, NY., April 7, 2018; 59th Annual Meeting of the APS Division of Plasma Physics, Milwaukee, WI, Oct. 23-27, 2017; 2017 APS Division of Plasma Physics Outstanding Undergraduate Poster Award; 2018 Omega Laser Facility Users Group Workshop Student Poster Award.
- ItemMeasurement of the 6He Decay Produced by the 9Be(n,α)6He Reaction(Houghton College, 2016-10-31) Coats, Micah; Cook, Katelyn; Yuly, Mark; Padalino, Stephen; Sangster, Craig; Regan, SeanThe OMEGA laser at LLE is routinely used to implode gasfilled capsules to study light ion fusion reaction rates of interest to stellar nucleosynthesis. As a first step toward a possible measurement of the 3H(t,γ)6He radiative capture reaction, a detector system capable of measuring the 807 ms half-life of 6He has been developed and is being tested using 6He nuclei produced via the 9Be(n,α)6He reaction. Deuterons from the SUNY Geneseo tandem Pelletron produce neutrons in a thick deuterated polyethylene target via the 2H(d,n)3He reaction. These neutrons are allowed to strike a beryllium target placed in front of a silicon dE-E detector telescope, which is used to identify the β particles from 6He decay. Following an approximately five second long activation period, the beryllium sample is immediately counted for about five seconds. The pulse heights for each detector and the timestamp are recorded using a specially configured femtoDAQ acquisition system and used to measure the decay curve. Funded in part by a grant from the DOE through the Laboratory for Laser Energetics.Omega Laser User’s Group Meeting, Laboratory for Laser Energetics, Rochester, NY, April 26, 2017; XXXVI Annual Rochester Symposium for Physics Students, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY., April 1, 2017; 58th Annual Meeting of the APS Division of Plasma Physics, San Jose, CA, Oct. 31 – Nov. 4, 2016; 2016 APS Division of Plasma Physics Outstanding Undergraduate Poster Award; 2017 Omega Laser Facility Users Group Workshop Student Poster Award.
- ItemMeasurement of the Transverse Doppler Shift using the Mossbauer Effect(Houghton College, 2018-04-07) Coats, Micah; Yuly, MarkXXXVII Annual Rochester Symposium for Physics Students, SUNY Brockport (Brockport, NY).
- ItemMeasurement of the Transverse Doppler Shift Using the Mössbauer Effect(Houghton College, 2020-05-15) Coats, MicahAn undergraduate experiment to measure the transverse Doppler shift in an accelerating reference frame using the Mössbauer effect is being designed at Houghton College. Since Einstein’s equivalence principle can also be applied in an accelerating reference frame the experiment will be a test of the equivalence principle and therefore general relativity. No published undergraduate experiments testing general relativity have been published so the design of this experiment would be pioneering. Recent work has focused on making weak 57Co Mössbauer sources suitable for undergraduate settings and on the design of the experiment. The use of weak Mössbauer sources is made possible with a coincidence technique that reduces background.