Energy Distributions of Product Particles from Nitrogen-Induced Nuclear Reactions on Beryllium

The energy distributions of protons, deuterons, and alpha particles from N¹⁴ bombardment of Be⁹ were measured with a particle-selective counter. The apparatus is described. The results show approximate agreement with the simple statistical assumptions of continuum theory both in regard to the shapes of the spectra and to the relative yields of protons, deuterons, tritons, and α particles. Reasonable agreement with the level-density formula ω(E)=exp2[a(E-b)]1/2 is possible with $a=1.1$, $b=0$ forF¹⁹; $a=1.4$, $b=0$ for Ne²¹; and $a=2.6$, $b=4.9$ for Ne²².