Comparison of nuclear reactions for the production of monoenergetic neutron fields with energies below 100 keV

NPL, PTB, IRMM and IRSN are involved, within a scientific cooperation, in a comprehensive study aimed at developing reference low-energy monoenergetic neutron fields. This paper will explain the importance of such developments, highlighted by the over response of neutron survey meters in the keV energy range, and also describe the main difficulties encountered. The variation of the neutron yield with ion beam energy from the neutron threshold up to about 50 keV has been measured at IRSN AMANDE facility for the 45Sc(p,n), 65Cu(p,n), 51V(p,n), 57Fe(p,n) and 37Cl(p,n) reactions.