Abstract
Abstract Natural gadolinium is widely used for its excellent thermal neutron capture cross section, because of its two major isotopes: $^{\rm 155}$Gd and $^{\rm 157}$Gd. We measured the $\gamma$-ray spectra produced from the thermal neutron capture on targets comprising a natural gadolinium film and enriched $^{\rm 155}$Gd (in Gd$_{2}$O$_{3}$ powder) in the energy range from 0.11 MeV to 8.0 MeV, using the ANNRI germanium spectrometer at MLF, J-PARC. The freshly analyzed data of the $^{\rm 155}$Gd($n, \gamma$) reaction are used to improve our previously developed model (ANNRI-Gd model) for the $^{\rm 157}$Gd($n, \gamma$) reaction [K. Hagiwara et al. [ANNRI-Gd Collaboration], Prog. Theor. Exp. Phys. 2019, 023D01 (2019)], and its performance confirmed with the independent data from the $^{\rm nat}$Gd($n, \gamma$) reaction. This article completes the development of an efficient Monte Carlo model required to simulate and analyze particle interactions involving the thermal neutron captures on gadolinium in any relevant future experiments.
Highlights
Gadolinium (Gd) has become an important element of consideration in a number of neutrino experiments for enhanced detection of electron anti-neutrinos
Based on our data and a Geant4-based detector simulation [36,37] of our setup, we developed a Monte Carlo (MC) model to generate the full γ -ray spectrum from the thermal 157,155,natural Gd (natGd)(n,γ ) reaction
We present the γ -ray energy spectra from the 155Gd(n, γ ) and natGd(n, γ ) reactions, modify our Accurate Neutron– Nucleus Reaction Measurement Instrument (ANNRI)-Gd model with the contribution from 155Gd, and present our final MC performance for natGd(n, γ ) to be used by any neutrino or other experiments involving the measurement of γ -ray signals from the thermal neutron capture on Gd
Summary
Gadolinium (Gd) has become an important element of consideration in a number of neutrino experiments for enhanced detection of electron anti-neutrinos (νe). The Detector for Advanced Neutron Capture Experiments (DANCE) at the Los Alamos Neutron Science Center (LANSCE) has extensively studied the γ -ray energy spectra from the radiative neutron capture reaction at various multiplicities in the neutron kinetic energy range from 1 to 300 eV for both 155Gd and 157Gd targets [28,29,30]. We present the γ -ray energy spectra from the 155Gd(n, γ ) and natGd(n, γ ) reactions, modify our ANNRI-Gd model with the contribution from 155Gd, and present our final MC performance for natGd(n, γ ) to be used by any neutrino or other experiments involving the measurement of γ -ray signals from the thermal neutron capture on Gd
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