Formation of bound dineutrons in the 175Lu (n, 2n) 174 gLu nuclear reaction and its cross-section

Abstract

The dineutron as a bound chargeless nucleus of two identical nucleons has been attracting attention for many decades. In addition to the study of the formation of a bound dineutron in the outgoing channel of specific nuclear reactions, cross-section estimates have been gaining interest as research targets. We used a traditional neutron activation technique to irradiate Lu samples followed by measurements of the induced activity with HPGe spectrometer in order to detect gamma-peaks of the 175Lu (n, 2n)174 gLu reaction product when this reaction channel is not open for incident neutron energies. Based on two measurements of the instrumental gamma-ray spectra of Lu samples we reliably identified the presence of the 174 gLu isotope in the outgoing channel of the 175Lu (n, 2n)174 gLu nuclear reaction. Also, the cross-section for this nuclear reaction was obtained and to be equal 33.5−6.7+7.0 mb. For the first time, the dineutron as a nuclearreaction product was indirectly detected via statistically significant observation of the induced activity of 174 gLu with a corresponding cross-section estimate.

Keywords

• Bound dineutron
• Neutron-induced nuclear reaction
• Lutetium-175
• Reaction cross-section
• Binding energy interval estimate