Nuclear excitation functions from 40-200 MeV proton irradiation of terbium

TL;DR

This study measures nuclear formation cross sections for 26 radionuclides produced by 40-200 MeV proton irradiation of terbium, aiding medical isotope production and stellar nucleosynthesis modeling.

Contribution

It provides new experimental cross section data for terbium irradiation and compares these with computational models to improve predictive accuracy.

Findings

Measured cross sections for 26 radionuclides.

Comparison of experimental data with multiple nuclear reaction codes.

Yields calculated for medically relevant radionuclides.

Abstract

Nuclear formation cross sections are reported for 26 radionuclides, measured with 40 to 200 MeV proton irradiations of terbium foils. These data are relevant to the production of medically relevant radionuclides (e.g., 152Tb, 155Tb, 155Eu, and 156Eu) and to ongoing efforts to characterize stellar nucleosynthesis routes passing through long-lived intermediaries (e.g., 153Gd). Computational predictions from the ALICE2011, CEM03.03, Bertini, and INCL+ABLA codes are compared with newly measured data to contribute to the ongoing process of code development, and yields are calculated for selected radionuclides using measured data.