Beta-Decay Matrix Elements inSb122

Abstract

An electronic computer has been used to investigate the six nuclear matrix elements which enter into the ${2}^{\ensuremath{-}}$ to ${2}^{+}$ 1.40-MeV beta transition in the decay of ${\mathrm{Sb}}^{122}$. Data from beta-gamma angular correlation, beta-circularly polarized gamma angular correlation, nuclear orientation, and nuclear resonance experiments were used in this analysis. As a further aid, the Feenberg-Ahrens relations between certain of the nuclear matrix elements were employed to catalog the solutions and to simplify the search problem. In order to discover how the remaining ambiguity of these solutions could most easily be reduced, for each of the solutions calculations were made of the predicted results of all possible experiments on this beta transition. These calculations show how sufficient experimental data can be obtained to determine unambiguously all six nuclear matrix elements. In an appendix all the theoretical formulas which give the experimental observables for a first forbidden ${2}^{\ensuremath{-}}$ to ${2}^{+}$ beta transition in terms of the nuclear matrix elements are summarized.