The stable isotopes of xenon span a region which exhibits an evolution of nuclear structure from spherical to gamma-soft behavior; thus these nuclei may provide insight into the nature of this transition. Highly enriched (>99.9%) 132Xe and 134Xe gases were converted to solid 132XeF2 and 134XeF2, and were used as scattering samples for inelastic neutron scattering measurements at the University of Kentucky Accelerator Laboratory. Lifetimes of levels up to 3.5 MeV in excitation energy in 132Xe and 134Xe were determined using the Doppler-shift attenuation method. Gamma rays corresponding to new transitions and levels have been observed and reduced transition probabilities have also been determined. This new information will be examined in an effort to elucidate the structure of these transitional nuclei.The nuclear structure of 134Xe is also of relevance for neutrinoless double-beta decay experiments, specifically those searching for the decay of 136Xe to 136Ba. For example, the detector constructed by the EXO collaboration utilizes liquid xenon as the source and detector and is enriched to 80% in 136Xe, while the remaining 20% is 134Xe. As neutrons may be produced by either incident muons or natural radionuclides present in the surroundings, excited states in either isotope may be populated by inelastic neutron scattering. Therefore, ? rays emitted upon de-excitation of 134Xe which have energies near the neutrinoless double-beta decay end-point energy, 2458.7 keV, may obscure the observation of this rare decay. New ? rays corresponding to transitions in 134Xe have been observed in this energy region, within the resolution of the EXO detector. Gamma-ray production cross sections have been measured and will be discussed. This material is based upon work supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation under grant no. PHY-1305801.

Nuclear structure of <sup>132,134</sup>Xe:Relevance to shape transitions and neutrinoless double-beta decay

248th National Meeting (2014)

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.

Nuclear structure of 132,134Xe:Relevance to shape transitions and neutrinoless double-beta decay

Nuclear structure of ^132,134Xe:Relevance to shape transitions and neutrinoless double-beta decay