Eur. Phys. J. A 15, 65-68 (2002)
DOI: 10.1140/epja/i2001-10227-7

Coulomb breakup of and the flux of neutrinos from the Sun

B. Davids^{1, 2}, S.M. Austin^{1, 2}, D. Bazin¹, H. Esbensen³, B.M. Sherrill^{1, 2}, I.J. Thompson⁴ and J.A. Tostevin<sup>4

1</sup>  National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA
²  Department of Physics and Astronomy, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA
³  Physics Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, IL 60439, USA
⁴  Department of Physics, School of Physics and Chemistry, University of Surrey, Guildford, UK

davids@kvi.nl

(Received: 21 March 2002 / Published online: 31 October 2002)

Abstract
A kinematically complete measurement was made of the Coulomb dissociation of ⁸B nuclei on a Pb target at 83 MeV/nucleon. The cross-section was measured at low relative energies in order to infer the astrophysical S-factor for the ⁷Be(p, ) ⁸B reaction. A first-order perturbation theory analysis of the reaction dynamics including E1, E2, and M1 transitions was employed to extract the E1 strength relevant to neutrino-producing reactions in the solar interior. By fitting the measured cross-section from  = 130 keV to 400 keV, we find S₁₇(0)=17.8^+1.4_-1.2 eV b. Semiclassical 1st-order perturbation theory and fully quantum-mechanical continuum-discretized coupled-channels analyses yield nearly identical results for the E1 strength relevant to solar-neutrino flux calculations, suggesting that theoretical reaction mechanism uncertainties need not limit the precision of Coulomb-breakup determinations of the ⁷Be(p, ) ⁸B S-factor. A recommended value of S₁₇(0) based on a weighted average of this and other measurements is presented. This recommendation implies a revised value for the theoretical flux of ⁸B solar neutrinos, which is also given.

PACS
25.70.De - Coulomb excitation.
26.20.+f - Hydrostatic stellar nucleosynthesis.
26.65.+t - Solar neutrinos.

© Società Italiana di Fisica, Springer-Verlag 2002