Neutron-Induced Capture Cross Sections Via The Surrogate Reaction Method

The surrogate reaction method is an indirect way of determining cross sections for nuclear reactions that proceed through a compound nucleus. This technique enables neutron-induced cross sections to be extracted for nuclear reactions on short-lived unstable nuclei that otherwise can not be measured. This technique has been succesfully applied to determine the neutron-induced fission cross sections of several short-lived nuclei. In this work, we investigate whether this powerful technique can also be used to determine of neutron-induced capture cross sections. For this purpose we use the surrogate reaction Yb-174(He-3,p gamma)Lu-176 to infer the well known Lu-175(n,gamma) cross section and compare the results with the directly measured neutron-induced data. This surrogate experiment has been performed in March 2010. The experimental technique used and the first preliminary results will be presented.