Neutron Physics

India.

Preface

The 1961 Neutron Physics Symposium, sponsored by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and the American Nuclear Society, brought together many of those who are active today in neutron physics research. The prepared addresses, collected here in full, constitute a review and a summary of recent results in this field; portions of the discussion stimulated by these papers are included here. Attendance at the meeting was by open invitation to interested technical people; the announcement was primarily through ANS channels. The papers on the program were presented by invitation; the number of speakers was limited by the time available for the meeting.

The scope of the technical discussion was intended to include key areas of research in neutron and reactor physics while recognizing that the present breadth of the field virtually precludes the possibility of complete coverage in one symposium. The remarks of Dr. H. Hurwitz extended the discussion to the general area of energy sources, surveying the fusion problem. The papers here presented, in most cases originally transcribed from tape recordings, have been reviewed by the authors. They were encouraged to correct rather than rewrite the manuscripts which they received; the result is a generally informal style which I believe is more readable than usual textbook or periodical prose.

The idea for the symposium was stimulated by the imminent dedication at RPI of one of the country’s major facilities for neutron physics research. This linear accelerator project, described in one of the present papers, is supported by the Atomic Energy Commission. In addition to expressing our appreciation of this support, we wish to acknowledge our debt of gratitude to the personnel of the Reactor Development Branch and the New York Operations Office; their difficult and often thankless administrative role is vital to progress in this field of technical development. The symposium was arranged by a committee consisting of E. R. Gaerttner (Chairman), P. B. Daitch, R. Ehrlich, Norman Francis, Henry Hurwitz, and V. L. Parsegian. Chairmen of the formal sessions were R. Ehrlich, M. L. Yeater, and Ira F. Zartman. Tape recordings of the talks were reviewed by D. B. Ebeoglu, M. J. Ohanian, and C. R. Pierce. We are indebted to H. C. Mattice and to the public relations office of the Institute for working out the mechanics of the meeting.

M.L. YEATER,     Troy, New York April, 1962

Opening Remarks

V. LAWRENCE PARSEGIAN,     Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York

I am happy to welcome you on behalf of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and the Northeastern New York Section of the American Nuclear Society. I hope that while you are here you will learn something about us, RPI, and the Section, in addition to enjoying the technical discussions. I suspect that most of you do not realize that RPI is the oldest continuing engineering institution of this country. Troy, incidentally, also boasts the first school for girls in the country, the Emma Willard School. The Institute has an undergraduate enrollment of nearly 3000 and is the largest private undergraduate engineering school in the country in the number that we graduate. The graduate enrollment is about 400 full-time day students, with another 300 or 400 evening students; our Hartford Graduate Center has another 600 graduate students in that Connecticut area.

When you visit the Nuclear Engineering and Science Center, you will note that there is provision for a wide range of activities revolving around the linear accelerator. In addition to neutron physics and reactor physics, we are interested in a broad range of research related to radiation effects, nuclear technology, solid state work, chemistry, and particularly materials research. You will note that the facility includes a hot cell so that a sizeable program in analysis of radioactive materials will be possible. I expect that the scientists concerned with cross-section measurements and reactor physics will also make full use of this additional facility. The fact that the linear accelerator permits intense but very short radiation pulses, down to the order of 10-7 sec or less, opens up new possibilities for exploring the kinetics of radiation effects and of chemical reactions. For example, this pulse time becomes comparable to the lifetime of free radicals; one may therefore explore the effects of radiation with time of irradiation as a parameter, going down to the lifetime of the events that are involved.

The subcritical assembly which we have on the campus is open to visitors during this meeting, and may be of particular interest to those of you who have teaching responsibilities. Professor Valente can best provide information about this equipment and its use. Let me say again that we are delighted to extend to you the hospitality of this campus, and I do hope your stay here will be a pleasant one.

The Low Energy Cross Sections of Fissile Nuclides

B.R. LEONARD, Jr.,     Hanford Laboratories, General Electric Company, Richland, Washington

ABSTRACT

A survey has been made of the experimental data for the cross sections and fission parameters of the fissile nuclides: U²³³, U²³⁵, and Pu²³⁹ for the Neutron Physics Symposium at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, May 5-6, 1961. The best available data have been used to construct the most probable behavior of the low energy cross sections which are presented graphically. It is shown that the most probable 2200-meter/sec parameters of U²³³ and U²³⁵ form a set of values which are consistent with the results of ratio measurements. The values which are provisionally derived are for U²³³: σnT = 587 ± 3, σnn = 12 ± 3, σnx = 575 ± 4, σnγ = 49 ± 2, σnf = 526 ± 4, α = 0.0935 ± 0.0038, ν = 2.502 ± 0.014, and η = 2.288 ± 0.010, and for U²³⁵: σnT = 694 ± 4, σnn = 16 ± 3, σnx = 678 ± 5, σnγ = 99 ± 4, σnf = 579 ± 6, α = 0.172 ± 0.007, ν = 2.434 ± 0.019, and η = 2.077 ± 0.010. It is recommended that a least squares adjustment similar to that made for U²³³ by Evans and Fluharty should be made for the U²³³ and U²³⁵ parameters as a single set. For Pu²³⁹ the lack of precise determinations of 1 + α preclude the development of a set of parameters in the same manner as done for U²³³ and U²³⁵. The Pu²³⁹ parameters of σnf, v, and η which can be derived from ratio measurements with U²³⁵ are shown to have an internal inconsistency of 4.3% when combined with the most probable value of σnx. On the assumption that the measurements of η are most likely discrepant, the most probable values of the 2200-meter/sec parameters for Pu²³⁹ are taken to be: σnT = 1018 ± 5, σnn = 10 ± 3, σnx = 1008 ± 6, σnγ = 254 ± 11, σnf = 754 ± 9, α = 0.337 ± 0.017, ν = 2.89 ± 0.05, and η = 2.16 ± 0.05.

Introduction

During the past 2 years a number of experiments have been completed which were designed to determine low energy neutron cross sections and fission parameters of the important fissile nuclides with high precision. I refer especially to the efforts at obtaining precise total cross sections at Columbia University and BNL by Safford and Havens; at ORNL by Block, Slaughter, and Harvey; and at the MTR by Simpson, Moore, and Simpson. Also, important experiments on precise determinations of η and ν have been made at ORNL by the Saussure, Macklin, Gwin, Magnuson, and others. In addition, a considerable effort has been expended in critical review of the status of knowledge of these parameters. In this connection I would particularly mention the review of U²³³ cross sections by Evans and Fluharty¹ and of the U²³⁵ cross sections by Safford and Havens.² It is appropriate at this time to combine the results of recently completed experiments with these reviews and survey the status of our present knowledge of these neutron cross sections. The results of this survey will show that the low energy neutron parameters of U²³³ and U²³⁵ form a very consistent set of numbers, at least at the level of about 1% precision. For the case of Pu²³⁹ the situation is not nearly so cheerful as the best neutron parameters which have been obtained are of the order of 4% discrepant. However, the outlook for the near future is bright as several definitive experiments on Pu²³⁹ parameters are now in progress.

In the present survey the best available information on the low energy behavior of the total and fission cross sections has been compiled and presented in graphical form. It is intended that this presentation will demonstrate the extent with which the results of separate measurements of the same cross section are consistent with each other. These comparisons show that small systematic effects are frequently present in any single measurement such that it is necessary to consider the resulting dispersions of data to assign best values of cross section behavior. In this way also reliable estimates can be made of the uncertainties which are involved in the use of these cross section curves in practical applications.

The survey also studies the question of the best values of the 2200-meter/sec neutron parameters of these nuclides. In this study the logical approach which is attempted leans heavily on the outstanding review article on the evaluation of the U²³³ neutron parameters by Evans and Fluharty. One aspect of this approach is the solution of the problem which arises from the overdetermination of the neutron parameters because of the experiments which involve the determination of combinations of parameters. Closely related to this aspect is the suggestion of Evans and Fluharty that U²³³ is a promising standard for comparison measurements because of the near 1/ν behavior of its thermal cross sections. Actually, the present survey will show that the U²³⁵ cross section behavior is sufficiently close to 1/ν that its neutron parameters are determined to the same order of precision as has been possible for U²³³.

The present study determines the separate parameters for U²³³ and U²³⁵ from the following procedure: The best value of σnx is determined from the total cross section and the estimated scattering cross section. The best value of α is obtained from experiment and a best value of η is also obtained from experiment. These three parameters: absorption, α, and η then determine the remaining parameters of fission cross section, capture, and ν The resulting derived parameters are then compared with the values obtained in direct measurement and with the values of the U²³⁵: U²³³ ratios of parameters obtained in direct measurements. The comparison will be seen to be an excellent one except for the case of the absolute values of the fission cross sections. For the study of the parameters of Pu²³⁹ this procedure cannot be used because of the lack of precision determinations of α. The Pu²³⁹ results must be obtained primarily from ratio measurements with U²³⁵. As will be seen this procedure yields Pu²³⁹ parameters which are badly discrepant.

There have been three recent measurements of the total cross section of U²³³ for low neutron energies. The results of these measurements are shown in where a value of 12 barns has been used for σnn. The scale is such that the small deviation from 1/ν of the absorption cross section can be clearly seen. The solid points represent the data of Simpson et al.³ obtained with a fast chopper using a metallic sample. Each point represents an average of several experimental values in a very small energy interval. The open circles represent the data of Block et al.⁴ also obtained with a fast chopper and a metallic sample. The points below 0.035 ev represent the average of several experimental values in a very small energy interval. The other data are those of Safford et al.⁵ obtained with a crystal spectrometer. The triangular points were obtained using a metal foil. The three lowest energy values are at wavelengths beyond the Bragg cutoff for uranium so that no scattering cross section has been subtracted from these values. The other data of Safford et al. were obtained with a liquid sample so that the 12-barn scattering cross section was subtracted from all of the data. The liquid sample data were taken so that the irregular effects of Bragg scattering would not be present. However, the data obtained show a much larger dispersion from a smooth curve than the data of Block et al. and Simpson et al. and consequently the data of Safford et al. have not been included on the graph for energies above 0.035 ev. In addition, a systematic inconsistency is noted between the metal and liquid sample measurements at the lowest energies with the liquid sample results being much higher. This indicates the possibility of coherent liquid scattering effects at low energies so that the primary emphasis is given to the results obtained with metallic samples. A similar systematic effect is noted in the identical experiments performed on U²³⁵.

Fig. 1 Absorption cross section data for U²³³ from 0 to 0.1 ev. A value of 12 barns for σnn has been subtracted except for the metal samples beyond Bragg cutoff. The data of Block et al. and Simpson et al. represent averages of data over small energy intervals. The solid curve estimates the most probable smooth behavior of the cross section. The dashed lines represent 0.5% deviations from the smooth curve.

The solid line drawn through the data is a smooth curve which has only been fitted by eye. It follows most closely the MTR data which have by far the smallest dispersion from a smooth curve. The dashed lines represent deviations of ±0.5% and demonstrate that the shape of the absorption cross section is probably well determined within these limits.

The three experimental groups have each reported best values of the 2200-meter/sec total cross section from the data shown on Fig. 1. The ORNL and MTR values are both 587 barns as obtained from least squares fits over the energy interval of approximately 0.02 to 0.04 ev. The Columbia group reports values of 587 and 586 barns for the liquid and metal sample data. However, the Columbia values are obtained from least squares fits to data to considerably higher energies (0.08 and 0.06 ev), and it is observed that the actual measured values at 2200-meter/sec are 3 and 1 barns smaller than the least squares values. Because of the small number of experimental points and the large energy region which was used in the least squares analysis it is not clear that the least squares values are better estimates than the monoenergetic results. This factor must be considered in assigning a final uncertainty to a best value for the 2200-meter/sec total cross section.

Figure 2 shows the MTR fission cross section data as a function of energy of Moore et alin an energy interval much smaller than Γ in an off-resonance region such as this is not expected theroretically. In addition, the multilevel analysis of Moore and Reich⁷ has ascribed 80% of the fission cross section in this region to a constant 1/ν, noninterfering component.

Fig. 2 Fission cross section data for U²³³ of Moore et al. from 0 to 0.1 ev. The smooth curve is the curve fitted to the absorption cross section on Fig. 1 divided by the best value of 1 + α.

In summary, the absorption and fission cross section data of U²³⁵ are consistent to within about ± 0.5% with the assumption of a constant behavior of α up to 0.08 ev. The assumption is further supported by the measurements of Palevsky et al.⁸ which showed no variation with energy of η from 0.01 to 0.1 ev to within 1%. In addition, a significant variation in ν with energy in this energy region is extremely unlikely. As was previously mentioned some 80% of the low energy cross section of U²³³ is ascribed to a noninterfering component and for U²³⁵ and Pu²³⁹, where the interfering component accounts for the major fraction of the cross section, experiments have shown that the variation of ν with energy is less than 1%.

Derivation of the 2200-Meter/Sec Neutron Parameters for U²³³

The derivation of the 2200-meter/sec neutron parameters for U²³³ is outlined in Table I. The arrows show the combination of values from which the remaining parameters are derived. All of the values shown are monoenergetic 2200-meter/sec values based on the assumption that α and ν are constant in the low energy region and that the g factors of U²³³ at low energies are unity. The g factors are certainly very close to unity, but the procedure could be refined by using the curves of Figs. 1 and 2 to compute ga and gf.

Table I

Derivation of the 2200 Meter/Sec Neutron Parameters for U²³³a

aThe values shown are based on the assumption that the g factors for U²³³ at 2200 meter/sec are unity and that α and ν are constant in the low energy