LIFETIMES OF THE 16O 6.13-MeV LEVEL AND THE 17O 0.871-MeV LEVEL

The mean lifetimes of the 0.871-MeV state of 17O(E2) and the 6.13-MeV state of 16O(E3) have been measured by a new recoil method using a Ge(Li) gamma-ray detector. The data yield mean lifetimes of (2.33 ± 0.27) × 10−10 and (2.5 ± 0.2) × 10−11 sec for the states in 17O and 16O respectively. The recoil method is generally applicable to the measurement of lifetimes greater than about 5 × 10−12 sec and provides a technique for a region of time where neither direct electronic timing nor Doppler-shift attenuation methods are accurate.