Investigation of 54Fe(n,γ)55Fe and 35Cl(n, γ)36Cl reaction cross sections at keV energies by Accelerator Mass Spectrometry

Activations with neutrons in the keV energy range were routinely performed at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) in Germany in order to simulate stellar conditions for neutron-capture cross sections. A quasi-Maxwell-Boltzmann neutron spectrum of kT = 25 keV, being of interest for the astrophysical s-process, was produced by the ⁷Li(p,n) reaction utilizing a 1912 keV proton beam at the Karlsruhe Van de Graaff accelerator. Activated samples resulting in long-lived nuclear reaction products with half-lives in the order of yr 100 Myr were analyzed by Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS). Comparison of the obtained reaction cross sections to literature data from previous Time-of-Flight (ToF) measurements showed that the selected AMS data are systematically lower than the ToF data. To investigate this discrepancy, ⁵⁴Fe(n,γ)⁵⁵Fe and ³⁵Cl(n,γ)³⁶Cl reaction cross sections were newly measured at the Frankfurt Neutron Source (FRANZ) in Germany. To complement the existing data, an additional neutron activation of ⁵⁴Fe and ³⁵Cl at a proton energy of 2 MeV was performed. The results will give implications for the stellar environment at kT = 90 keV, reaching the not yet experimentally explored high-energy s-process range. AMS measurements of the activated samples are scheduled.