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Description
An accelerator based epithermal neutron source (VITA) is proposed, created and is functioning at the Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics. VITA includes an originally designed tandem electrostatic particle accelerator (vacuum-insulated tandem accelerator) to produce a monoenergetic beam of protons or deuterons with energies from 0.3 to 2.3 MeV, currents up to 10 mA, and a thin lithium target to generate a powerful neutron flow in 7Li(p,n)7Be and Li(d,n) reactions. The facility is used to develop a boron neutron capture therapy and many other applications.
It is known from literature sources that heavy impurities in the composition of a lithium target significantly decrease the neutron yield and make the target unusable. The purpose of this work was to study the accumulation of impurities in a thin lithium target.
The elemental composition of the sample was determined by an ion scattering spectroscopy. The composition of the lithium layer immediately after evaporation onto a copper substrate was determined in the experiments. The interaction of lithium with air and the effect of the impurities on the neutron yield were studied. The accumulation of impurities during proton beam irradiation of the target at a beam power density of 1 kW/cm2 and up to 3.4 kW/cm2 was investigated.
This research was funded by Russian Science Foundation, grant number 19-72-30005, https://rscf.ru/project/19-72-30005.
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