Analysis of mean kinetic energies in H2O/D2O mixtures by neutron total cross-section measurements

In this work we present neutron total cross-section measurements on H2O/D2O liquid mixtures at room temperature in the epithermal energy range employing the transmission technique at the Bariloche electron linear accelerator (LINAC) (Argentina). The analysis of the asymptotic behavior shows that the Hydrogen, Deuterium, and Oxygen mean kinetic energies obtained for the different molecular species (H2O, D2O and HDO) are in excellent agreement with the reference values presented in the literature. Transmission being a technique extremely simple, the results are free of several corrections and characterizations of the experimental set-up which are necessary to apply in more detailed techniques. The results presented in this work show the utility of transmission experiments, not only for obtaining values of neutron cross sections, but also to perform dynamic analysis useful to verify different models proposed to describe the interaction between neutrons and different systems of interest