Studies of neutron-induced light-ion production with the MEDLEY facility

Abstract

The growing interest in applications involving high-energy neutrons (E > 20MeV) demands high-quality experimental data on neutron-induced reactions. Such data have been measured with the MEDLEY setup at the The Svedberg Laboratory (TSL), Uppsala, Sweden. It has been used to measure differential cross sections for elastic nd scattering and double-differential cross sections for light-ion production (A ≤ 4) with targets ranging from C to U and at incident neutron energies around 96MeV. We summarize the experimental results obtained so far and compared with theoretical reaction model calculations. A new method for correcting charged-particle spectra for thick target effects has been used for data obtained with the MEDLEY facility. The new quasi-monoenergetic neutron beam facility of TSL offers the possibility to extend these measurements up to neutron energies of 175MeV. In January 2007, the neutron beam facility at TSL has been equipped with improved shielding and pre-collimator to reduce the background observed with MEDLEY during the first experimental campaigns at 175MeV to an acceptable level. We present the current status of the MEDLEY facility after the shielding upgrade. We summarize also our ongoing projects including both measurements of light-ion production at 175MeV from C to U targets and fission studies of U-238 in the energy region of 11 to 175MeV.