Radioactive nickel-63 captures a neutron before it can decay. It is an early branch point of the s-process, and it decides how much copper massive stars make.
Nickel-63 lives about a century in the laboratory. In a massive star it can either decay into copper-63 or capture another neutron and become nickel-64; which of the two happens more often depends on how many neutrons are around and on this cross section. Massive stars are the main source of the copper in the Solar System, so the branching at nickel-63 shapes the copper, nickel and zinc they make. Measuring the reaction needs a radioactive sample, which is why it was first measured only in 2013.
Facts
- How well known
- Measured only since 2013, on a small radioactive sample; known to 15–20%.
- Live evaluation
- No live evaluation yet · Evaluations
- Reaction rates
- Explore the rates →
- Q-value · energy released
- 9.657 MeV
- Half-life of 63Ni
- 101 yr
- Measured in the laboratory; in a star, thermally excited states and ionization can change it. It decides how often this nucleus decays before it captures a neutron.
- Thermal energy kT
- about 26–90 keV, the energy of a gas at 300–1000 million kelvin
By stellar site
- 26 keVmassive star, core helium burning, 0.3 GK
- 90 keVmassive star, shell carbon burning, 1.04 GK
- Why no Gamow window
- A neutron feels no Coulomb barrier, so there is no Gamow window: the relevant energies are those of the thermal distribution itself, around kT.
- Kind
- Radiative capture
How it was measured
3 measurements, 2013–2015Show the listHide the list
2013
n_TOF, CERNCERN
Neutron beams and time of flight · thermal to 200 keV (neutron energy)
First measurement; 12 new resonances; MACS for kT = 5–100 keV with uncertainties around 20%. [1]
2014
n_TOF, CERNCERN
Neutron beams and time of flight · 10–270 keV (neutron energy)
Unresolved cross sections with a systematic uncertainty of 17%, published together with 62Ni(n,γ). [2]
2015
DANCE at LANSCELos Alamos Neutron Science Center, Los Alamos National Laboratory
Neutron beams and time of flight · neutron time of flight, relative to 197Au
Cross section with the 4π BaF2 calorimeter DANCE, uncertainties below 15%; resonances identified by their Q-value; network sensitivity studied. [3]
Measurements (EXFOR)
Every dataset EXFOR holds for this reaction, drawn by the energies it covers, against the energies a star uses.
14 datasets in 8 EXFOR entries, 1971–2015 · 5 without an energy range, not drawn
- Lowest energy in EXFOR
- 24.9 meV
- HARDER et al., 1992; Weigand et al., 2015 · σ · 22262.004
- Maxwellian averages measured
- 3 sets
- kT from 1 keV to 109 keV
- Rate from energies not in EXFOR
- < 0.01%
- at kT = 25.9 keV, smooth estimate
- Energies that matter at kT = 25.9 keV
- Outlined bars are shown but not counted (the rule is under “How these numbers are made”).
- A diamond is a dataset at a single energy. Bars running off the right edge continue to higher energies.
The datasets of the gap map, by quantity
| Quantity | Datasets | E_cm range (keV) |
|---|---|---|
| σcross section | 3 | 24.9 meV – 743 keV |
| MACSMaxwellian average | 3 | 1 keV – 109 keV |
| …other | 3 | 24.9 meV – 24.9 meV |
How these numbers are made
Lowest measured energy, everywhere in the data explorer: the lowest centre-of-mass energy at which a dataset in EXFOR measures the reaction itself (cross section, S-factor, angular distribution, yield or resonance strength), judged point by point. A point counts when it is a value, not an upper or lower limit, when it lies at least one standard deviation above zero, and when its energy is physical: at least 1 keV for charged particles, and not below the threshold of an endothermic reaction. Not counted: extrapolated, calculated, evaluated or derived values; superseded, deleted or preliminary data; ratios; a single S-factor value, which in EXFOR is a fit result; and indirect methods (Trojan horse, Coulomb dissociation, ANC, surrogate reactions), recognized from EXFOR's method and analysis codes, their text and the title. Frame and unit errors of EXFOR are corrected first, and values the literature shows to be upper limits are read as limits, from a list that gives the evidence for each. Datasets that reach the same energy within 0.5% are all credited, earliest first. Rate from energies not in EXFOR: the share of the rate integrand at that temperature outside the energy ranges the counted datasets cover (from their lowest measured point to their highest), with a constant S-factor (σ ∝ S(E₀)/E · e^−2πη, so the integrand is e^(−E/kT − 2πη)); for a neutron capture, σ ∝ 1/v. Resonances make the real integrand lumpy, so read it as a smooth baseline.
Details
How well known, in detail: Measured since 2013 on a radioactive sample at n_TOF and DANCE, with uncertainties of 15–20%.
Before 2013 the stellar cross section rested on calculations and extrapolations; KADoNiS recommended 31 ± 6 mb at kT = 30 keV. The first measurement, at n_TOF, covered thermal energies up to 200 keV, determined the capture kernels of 12 new resonances and gave MACS for kT = 5–100 keV with uncertainties around 20%; models of a 25 M☉ star showed a significant effect on the s-process production of 63Cu, 64Ni and 64Zn (Lederer et al. 2013). Unresolved cross sections from 10 to 270 keV, with a systematic uncertainty of 17%, followed (Lederer et al. 2014). At LANSCE the calorimetric 4π BaF2 array DANCE measured the cross section relative to 197Au with uncertainties below 15% (Weigand et al. 2015).
Evaluations
Compilations that combine the data into a recommended rate.
Related reactions
References
- 1.
C. Lederer et al. (n_TOF Collaboration)
Neutron capture cross section of unstable 63Ni: implications for stellar nucleosynthesis
Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 022501 (2013) · 10.1103/PhysRevLett.110.022501 · arXiv:1304.3310
- 2.
C. Lederer et al. (n_TOF Collaboration)
62Ni(n,γ) and 63Ni(n,γ) cross sections measured at the n_TOF facility at CERN
Phys. Rev. C 89, 025810 (2014) · 10.1103/PhysRevC.89.025810 · arXiv:1403.4778
- 3.
M. Weigand et al.
63Ni(n,γ) cross sections measured with DANCE
Phys. Rev. C 92, 045810 (2015) · 10.1103/PhysRevC.92.045810 · arXiv:1512.02263
- 4.
Z. Y. Bao, H. Beer, F. Käppeler, F. Voss, K. Wisshak, T. Rauscher
Neutron cross sections for nucleosynthesis studies
At. Data Nucl. Data Tables 76, 70 (2000) · 10.1006/adnd.2000.0838
- 5.
I. Dillmann et al.
Proc. Int. Conf. on Nuclear Data for Science and Technology 2007 (EDP Sciences, 2008), p. 575 (2008) · 10.1051/ndata:07303 · arXiv:0806.2076
How to cite this page
J. Skowronski, 63Ni(n,γ)64Ni, in Reaction atlas, 2026-10-12, https://jskowron.eu/atlas/63Ni-ng-64Ni.
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