New setup for measurement of prompt gammas from neutron interactions

Abstract

Prompt gamma radiation from neutron interactions is an important issue as it affects the operation of nuclear facilities (radiation protection or gamma heating issues) or has various uses (non-destructive identification of elements). Despite of importance, its production is inaccurately described in present nuclear data libraries. Therefore, a set of experiments have been carried out focusing on this radiation - prompt gamma from neutron inelastic scattering on oxygen and prompt gamma from radiative capture on manganese, both present the form of an aqueous solution. The gammas were induced by the Am-Be neutron source (for oxygen) and 252Cf spontaneous fission neutron source (for manganese). In the case of oxygen, the present libraries can be used, but all the libraries tested overestimated the experiment by 20–30%, considering the experimental uncertainty of 6-9%. INDEN-4.0 library is giving the best results. In the case of manganese, none of the libraries tested give acceptable results. The INDEN updated data for gamma production on manganese give usable results, but there is still a discrepancy from -36% to 55% with uncertainties from 6-15%.