2023/12/18 by D. Freire-Fernández, Freire-Fernández, D., W. Korten +117 · 2 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Atomic and Molecular Physics #FOS: Physical sciences #Nuclear Experiment (nucl-ex) #Nuclear Theory (nucl-th) #Nuclear physics research studies #Radiation Detection and Scintillator Technologies
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2312.11313
openalex publication_date 2023/12/18 · openalex created_date 2023/12/20 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/03
The nuclear two-photon or double-gamma (2γ) decay is a second-order electromagnetic process whereby a nucleus in an excited state emits two gamma rays simultaneously. To be able to directly measure the 2γ decay rate in the low-energy regime below the electron-positron pair-creation threshold, we combined the isochronous mode of a storage ring with Schottky resonant cavities. The newly developed technique can be applied to isomers with excitation energies down to ∼100 keV and half-lives as short as ∼10 ms. The half-life for the 2γ decay of the first-excited 0+ state in bare 72Ge ions was determined to be 23.9(6) ms, which strongly deviates from expectations.