THE FLUORINE DESTRUCTION IN STARS: FIRST EXPERIMENTAL STUDY OF THE {sup 19}F(p, {alpha}{sub 0}){sup 16}O REACTION AT ASTROPHYSICAL ENERGIES

Journal Article · Sat Oct 01 00:00:00 EDT 2011 · Astrophysical Journal Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1088/2041-8205/739/2/L54· OSTI ID:21565421

La Cognata, M; Spitaleri, C; Indelicato, I; Cherubini, S; Gulino, M; Kiss, G G; Lamia, L; Pizzone, R G; Puglia, S M. R.; Rapisarda, G G; Romano, S ^[1]; Mukhamedzhanov, A M ^[2]; Aliotta, M ^[3]; Burjan, V; Hons, Z; Kroha, V; Mrazek, J; Piskor, S ^[4]; Coc, A ^[5]; Palmerini, S ^[6]

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1. INFN-Laboratori Nazionali del Sud, Catania (Italy)
2. Cyclotron Institute-Texas A and M University, College Station, TX (United States)
3. School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, and SUPA-Scottish Universities Physics Alliance (United Kingdom)
4. Nuclear Physics Institute of ASCR, Rez near Prague (Czech Republic)
5. CSNSM CNRS/IN2P3, Universite Paris Sud, Orsay (France)
6. Dipartimento di Fisica-Universita di Perugia, and INFN-Sezione di Perugia, Perugia (Italy)

The {sup 19}F(p, {alpha}){sup 16}O reaction is an important fluorine destruction channel in the proton-rich outer layers of asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars and it might also play a role in hydrogen-deficient post-AGB star nucleosynthesis. So far, available direct measurements do not reach the energy region of astrophysical interest (E {sub cm} {approx}< 300 keV), because of the hindrance effect of the Coulomb barrier. The Trojan Horse (TH) method was thus used to access this energy region, by extracting the quasi-free contribution to the {sup 2}H({sup 19}F, {alpha}{sup 16}O)n and the {sup 19}F({sup 3}He, {alpha}{sup 16}O)d reactions. The TH measurement of the {alpha}{sub 0} channel shows the presence of resonant structures not observed before, which cause an increase of the reaction rate at astrophysical temperatures up to a factor of 1.7, with potential consequences for stellar nucleosynthesis.

• OSTI ID: 21565421
• Journal Information: Astrophysical Journal Letters, Vol. 739, Issue 2; Other Information: DOI: 10.1088/2041-8205/739/2/L54; ISSN 2041-8205
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

79 ASTROPHYSICS
COSMOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY
ALPHA PARTICLES
ASTROPHYSICS
FLUORINE
FLUORINE 19 TARGET
NUCLEOSYNTHESIS
OXYGEN 16
PROTON REACTIONS
STARS
BARYON REACTIONS
CHARGED PARTICLES
CHARGED-PARTICLE REACTIONS
ELEMENTS
EVEN-EVEN NUCLEI
HADRON REACTIONS
HALOGENS
IONIZING RADIATIONS
ISOTOPES
LIGHT NUCLEI
NONMETALS
NUCLEAR REACTIONS
NUCLEI
NUCLEON REACTIONS
OXYGEN ISOTOPES
PHYSICS
RADIATIONS
STABLE ISOTOPES
SYNTHESIS
TARGETS