¹²C(³He,p_x)¹⁴N and ¹³C(³He,p_x)¹⁵N Cross-Sections for Nuclear Reaction Analysis at Energies up to 6 MeV

The quality of data obtained via nuclear reaction analysis is directly dependent on the quality of cross-section data used. Unfortunately, the data available for the cross-sections of helium-3 on carbon-12 and carbon-13 either significantly disagree or there are no data available at all. For this master thesis systematic measurement of the ¹²C(³He,p_x)¹⁴N and ¹³C(³He,p_x)¹⁵N cross-sections has been performed for peaks with x=0..6 and x=0..11 for ¹²C and ¹³C, respectively, energies from 1.5 MeV to 6 MeV and angles of 135° and 175° using thin a-C:H layers. The ¹²C cross-section results have been benchmarked using thick pyrolytic graphite targets and SimNRA simulations and were found to be very accurate. As part of the measurements the accelerator beam energy was calibrated with a novel method combining simulations and measurements.