The formation cross sections of tritium from oxygen have been measured in p-Li and p-Be neutron fields installed at the INS SF cyclotron in order to estimate the production of tritium in the cooling water of accelerators. Irradiations were performed with the semi-monoenergetic neutrons produced from the ⁷Li(p,n) reaction at proton energies (Ep) from 20 up to 40 MeV in 5 MeV steps and those from ⁹Be(p,n) in 2.5 MeV steps with proton intensities of 2 - 5 (mu) A, which yields from 10¹¹ to 10¹² n/cm² at the target position. The neutron energy spectra were determined by an NE-213 scintillator. The tritium produced in the water used as the oxygen target was extracted by a distillation method, and measured by a liquid scintillation counter. The excitation functions for ¹⁶O(n,t)¹⁴N reaction obtained by the p-Li and p-Be neutrons agreed well with each other within the experimental uncertainties.

Date Published: 3 March 1995
PDF: 4 pages
Proc. SPIE 2339, International Conference on Neutrons and Their Applications, (3 March 1995); doi: 10.1117/12.204158

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 2339:
International Conference on Neutrons and Their Applications
George Vourvopoulos; Themis Paradellis, Editor(s)