Electrostatic Analysis of Nuclear Reaction Energies

Electrostatic analyzers for incident and product particles of nuclear reactions have been employed to measure the following ground-state Q values: Li⁶(p,He³)α (4.024±{}0.005 Mev), Li⁷(d,p)Li⁸ (-0.192±{}0.001 Mev), Be⁹(p,d)Be⁸ (0.558±{}0.002 Mev), Be⁹(p,α)Li⁶ (2.123±{}0.004 Mev), Be⁹(d,Li⁷)α (7.159±{}0.009 Mev). Absolute energy calibration was based on a Li⁷(p,n)Be⁷ threshold of 1.882±{}0.002 Mev. No systematic differences appear between these data and other measurements employing magnetic analysis and other absolute energy calibrations. Data taken on the inelastic scattering of both protons and deuterons from Li⁷ result in a value of 0.4780±{}0.0012 Mev for the first excited level of lithium. This figure overlaps previous gamma-ray measurements based on the 411.2-kev gamma from Au¹⁹⁸. The yield of alphas from deuteron bombardment of tritium absorbed in zirconium showed that the number of absorbed tritium atoms decreased rapidly near the surface of the zirconium. From this data, a lower limit of 17.578-0.030 Mev may be given the T(d,α)n Q value.