THM applied to the investigation of explosive astrophysical scenarios

Abstract

Abstract The Trojan Horse Method (THM) makes use of quasi-free reactions to deduce the cross section of nuclear reactions relevant for astrophysics at the energies of interest. Thanks to the suppression of the Coulomb barrier, the THM cross section does not exponentially vanishes at astrophysical energies. Here we will briefly summarise the fundamentals of the method, then we will discuss two applications of the method to reactions that have a pivotal role in the latest stages of stellar evolution, leading to explosive scenarios. In particular, we will focus on the indirect investigation of the 18F(p,α)15O reaction, which is the most important 18F destruction channel in novae, and the 12C + 12C reaction, which plays a critical role in astrophysics to understand stellar burning scenarios in carbon-rich environments, including supernovae.