The Cross-Section Investigation of (n, alpha) Reaction on Chromium Isotopes

Cross-sections of the (n, alpha) reaction on chromium isotopes are of great importance for determining the radiation hardness of stainless steel, which is widely used in nuclear reactors. The EXFOR library contains a limited amount of the relevant experimental data, mainly for the reactions induced by neutrons with an energy around 14 MeV. There are no experimental data on the probability of the (n, alpha) reaction at the fission neutron energies. In this work we present results of investigating the Cr-50(n, alpha) and Cr-52(n, alpha) reactions. It is shown that the ENDF/B VII library evaluations for the Cr-50(n, alpha) reaction are about 20 times as high as our experimental data. In addition, a structure that was predicted in none of the libraries is observed in the excitation function of the Cr-50(n, alpha) reaction. The Cr-52(n, alpha) reaction cross-sections at reactor neutron energies are obtained for the first time.