Production of 6He by bremsstrahlung of electron beam

The possibility for the production of exotic 6He nuclei in the 7Li(γ, p)6He reaction with the use of the 22 MeV electron beam provided by the MT-25 microtron was studied. This method was found to be quite effective tool for the production of the short-lived 6He ions. Two species of lithium salt, Li2CO3 and LiF, were tested as target material. Maximal yield of 6He atoms was obtained at irradiation of the fine-dispersed LiF salt loaded into cylindrical vessel. At the temperature of 800 °C the yield of 6He was found to be (1.7±0.2)×107atoms/s per 1 μA of electron beam current. The use of the ECR source (with efficiency of about 8%) gave a possibility to obtain the beam of 6He ions with intensity of (1.4±0.2)×106ions/s per 1 μA of electron beam current. The application of this approach for the further production of a monochromatic beam of accelerated 6He ions with an intensity higher than 108 pps (which can be easily reached already at 100 μA electron beam current) would make feasible a large number of experiments on investigating the structure of this nucleus and the mechanisms of nuclear reactions with its participation. This method for obtaining 6He nuclei may turn out to be one of the most optimal and inexpensive as compared with other methods using accelerated heavy ion projectiles.