Photodisintegration of 3H and 3He

The photoneutron cross sections for 3H and 3He have been measured from threshold to approx. 25 MeV with monoenergetic photons from the annihilation in flight of fast positrons at the LLL Electron-Positron Linear Accelerator facility. These reactions include the two-body breakup of 3H and the three-body breakup of both 3H and 3He; these measurements for 3H are the first to span the energy region across the peaks of the cross sections. An efficient BF3-tube-and-paraffin neutron detector and high-pressure gaseous samples of several moles each (the activity of the 3H sample was approx. 200,000 Ci) were employed in these measurements. Measurements on 16O and 2H also were performed to verify the absolute cross-section scale. The results, when compared with each other and with results for the two-body breakup cross section for 3He from the literature, show that the two-body breakup cross sections for 3H and 3He have nearly the same shape, but the one for 3He lies lower in magnitude; the three-body breakup cross section for 3He lies higher in magnitude and is broader in the peak region and also rises less sharply from threshold than that for 3H; and these measured differences between the cross sections for the breakup modes largely compensate in their sum, so that the total photon absorption cross sections for 3H and 3He are nearly the same in both size and shape at energies near and above their peaks. Theoretical results from the literature disagree with the experimental results to a certain extent over the entire photon-energy region for which the photoneutron cross sections were measured. 50 figures, 7 tables