Production and characterization of oxygen-reduced implanted 21Ne targets

Implanted neon targets were produced for nuclear astrophysics experiments at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum, and their characteristics were studied at the University of Notre Dame. The Ne ions were implanted sequentially at two different energies to create a more uniform depth distribution. The targets were stable under high beam loads. To reduce the amount of oxygen contamination on the target's surface, a procedure of chemical cleaning and thermal outgassing of targets was developed. The impact of this treatment on implanted Ne targets was investigated and found to reduce the oxygen amount by a factor of 4. The depth profile of the implanted Ne atoms was studied via narrow (p, γ) resonances while the oxygen contamination was monitored using the Deuteron-Induced γ-ray Emission (DIGE) method.