Determination of cross sections of 60Ni(n,2n)59Ni induced by 14Â MeV neutrons with accelerator mass spectrometry

The cross section of the 60Ni(n,2n)59Ni induced by neutron with energy around 14 MeV is important for a fusion environment. However, the published values are strongly discordant. By taking advantage of the high sensitivity of 59Ni measurement at China Institute of Atomic Energy (CIAE), determination of the cross section has been carried out. A natural Nickel foil was irradiated by neutrons produce by a T(D,n)α neutron generator. 57Co and 58Co which produced in the Nickel foil were chosen for the neutron fluence determination. Then the ratio of 59Ni/60Ni for the irradiated sample was determined via accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) utilizing a 13MV tandem accelerator and a Q3D magnet spectrometry at CIAE. As a result, the cross section of 60Ni(n,2n)59Ni for the incident neutron energy of (14.60 ± 0.40) MeV was determined to be (426 ± 53) mb.