Abstract
The 14 N(p, γ ) 15 O reaction controls the rate of CNO cycle hydrogen burning in various astrophysical sites and it is therefore one of the most important reactions in nuclear astrophysics. An experimental program is in progress to measure the 14 N(p, γ ) 15 O cross section in a wide energy range using a novel approach. A crucial quantity for the cross section determination is the number of N atoms in the target. In this paper the results of different experiments used for N target characterization are presented.
Highlights
Hydrogen burning is inevitably the most important energy source of the universe as this burning makes most of the visible stars shine
Several previous experiments proved that titanium nitride (TiN) is a well suited solid nitrogen compound for the purposes of cross section measurement
A high angle symmetric scan was measured in BraggBrentano θ-2θ geometry and the standard Powder Diffraction File (PDF) database has been used for identification of diffraction lines
Summary
Hydrogen burning is inevitably the most important energy source of the universe as this burning makes most of the visible stars shine. The rate of the cycle determines the energy generation and evolution of massive stars. The small contribution of the CNO cycle to the hydrogen burning of our Sun makes this cycle important for the better understanding of e.g. the solar composition. The slowest reaction of the CNO cycle is 14N(p,γ)15O which determines the rate of the whole cycle. The rate is obtained from the reaction cross section which must be known at low, stellar energies. These energies are not accessible experimentally due to the extremely low cross sections. The precision of the 14N(p,γ)15O reaction rate based on the experimental cross sections does not reach the level required for the stellar models. In this paper some details of the measurements carried out for the determination of this quantity as well as their results are presented
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