Determination of the fission averaged cross sections of some threshold reactions induced on chlorine, potassium, and calcium, and their role in the development of self-validated methods of neutron activation analysis

Abstract

The feasibility of validating data obtained in the determination of chlorine, potassium, and calcium by neutron capture activation analysis, through their determination using threshold reactions has been studied. To this purpose the authors experimentally determined the following fission neutron spectrum averaged cross sections (in mb):37Cl(n,p)37S, 0.234±0.015;41K(n,α)38Cl, 0.740±0.044;42Ca(n,p)42K, 3.09±0.22;43Ca(n,p)43K, 2.27±0.12;44Ca(n,p)44K, 0.074±0.013. The application of these values to the analysis of some reference materials are presented. Also, the problem of mutual interferences has been addressed for the following pairs:36S(n,Γ)37S and37Cl(n,p)37S;37Cl(n,Γ)38Cl and41K(n,α)38Cl;41K(n,ψ)42K and42Ca(n,p)42K.