Analysis of cross-section, S-factor and thermonuclear reaction rate of 8Li(α,n)11B and 14N(p,γ)15O using TALYS and EMPIRE nuclear reaction codes

Abstract

Theoretical nuclear reaction codes are crucial for studying cross-section and S-factors of nuclear reactions required for the thermonuclear reaction rate calculations. We analyze two reactions 8Li([Formula: see text])11B and 14N([Formula: see text])15O, using both TALYS and EMPIRE codes. We stress that these reactions are highly important for CNO cycle but the extent of involvement of experimental datasets are meager and conflicting. For the first reaction, the trend of experimental data has been predicted satisfactorily by the codes. The reaction rate is also matched with REACLIB calculation. However, in 14N([Formula: see text])15O, none of the codes could predict the resonant structures in the experimental data at the lower energies. The importance of our work is a sincere attempt to validate the TALYS and EMPIRE predictions for cross-section, S-factor and the reaction rate, simultaneously.