A measurement of (e,xn) cross sections of 181Ta with 100MeV electrons

By directly exchanging the virtual photons, energetic electrons can transmit energy to the target nuclei and induce the emission of neutrons, which is termed (e,n) neutrons. As a one-step reaction, in which the real bremsstrahlung photons are not needed to be involved, the (e,n) reaction can generate neutrons when high energy electrons penetrates a thin foil, resulting in a small point neutron source with ultra-short pulse-width, which would be useful for the fast neutron resonant analysis. In our previous research, the (e,n) cross section of 100 MeV electrons with 181Ta has been measured. In this research, the detailed information in the electro-disintegration are analyzed, and the cross sections of (e,xn) reactions, in which x is the number of emitted neutrons are measured. The results show that (e,xn) reactions will be even more important than the (γ,xn) reactions with an enlarged x, indicating that the (e,xn) reactions can be used to generate proton-rich nuclides, being beneficial to the proton-drip line research. Both the experimental results and the preliminary interpretation will be presented.