fbpx
Wikipedia

Neutron

February 15, 2024

This article is about the subatomic particle. For other uses, see Neutron (disambiguation).
Not to be confused with Neuron or Neutrino.

The neutron is a subatomic particle, symbol
n
 or
n0
, which has a neutral (not positive or negative) charge, and a mass slightly greater than that of a proton. Protons and neutrons constitute the nuclei of atoms. Since protons and neutrons behave similarly within the nucleus, they are both referred to as nucleons. Nucleons have a mass of approximately one atomic mass unit, or dalton, symbol Da. Their properties and interactions are described by nuclear physics. Protons and neutrons are not elementary particles; each is composed of three quarks.

Neutron
The quark content of the neutron. The color assignment of individual quarks is arbitrary, but all three colors must be present. Forces between quarks are mediated by gluons.
ClassificationBaryon
Composition1 up quark, 2 down quarks
StatisticsFermionic
FamilyHadron
InteractionsGravity, weak, strong, electromagnetic
Symbol
n
,
n0
,
N0
AntiparticleAntineutron
TheorizedErnest Rutherford[1] (1920)
DiscoveredJames Chadwick[2] (1932)
Mass1.67492749804(95)×10−27 kg[3]
939.56542052(54) MeV/c2[3]
1.00866491588(49) Da[4]
Mean lifetime879.4(6) s (free)[5]
Electric charge0 e
(−2±8)×10−22 e (experimental limits)[6]
Electric dipole moment< 1.8×10−26 e⋅cm (experimental upper limit)
Electric polarizability1.16(15)×10−3 fm3
Magnetic moment−0.96623650(23)×10−26 J·T−1[4]
−1.04187563(25)×10−3 μB[4]
−1.91304273(45) μN[4]
Magnetic polarizability3.7(20)×10−4 fm3
Spin1/2 ħ
Isospin−1/2
Parity+1
CondensedI(JP) = 1/2(1/2+)

The chemical properties of an atom are mostly determined by the configuration of electrons that orbit the atom's heavy nucleus. The electron configuration is determined by the charge of the nucleus, which is determined by the number of protons, or atomic number. The number of neutrons is the neutron number. Neutrons do not affect the electron configuration.

Atoms of a chemical element that differ only in neutron number are called isotopes. For example, carbon, with atomic number 6, has an abundant isotope carbon-12 with 6 neutrons and a rare isotope carbon-13 with 7 neutrons. Some elements occur in nature with only one stable isotope, such as fluorine. Other elements occur with many stable isotopes, such as tin with ten stable isotopes, or with no stable isotope, such as technetium.

The properties of an atomic nucleus depend on both atomic and neutron numbers. With their positive charge, the protons within the nucleus are repelled by the long-range electromagnetic force, but the much stronger, but short-range, nuclear force binds the nucleons closely together. Neutrons are required for the stability of nuclei, with the exception of the single-proton hydrogen nucleus. Neutrons are produced copiously in nuclear fission and fusion. They are a primary contributor to the nucleosynthesis of chemical elements within stars through fission, fusion, and neutron capture processes.

The neutron is essential to the production of nuclear power. In the decade after the neutron was discovered by James Chadwick in 1932, neutrons were used to induce many different types of nuclear transmutations. With the discovery of nuclear fission in 1938, it was quickly realized that, if a fission event produced neutrons, each of these neutrons might cause further fission events, in a cascade known as a nuclear chain reaction. These events and findings led to the first self-sustaining nuclear reactor (Chicago Pile-1, 1942) and the first nuclear weapon (Trinity, 1945).

Dedicated neutron sources like neutron generators, research reactors and spallation sources produce free neutrons for use in irradiation and in neutron scattering experiments. A free neutron spontaneously decays to a proton, an electron, and an antineutrino, with a mean lifetime of about 15 minutes. Free neutrons do not directly ionize atoms, but they do indirectly cause ionizing radiation, so they can be a biological hazard, depending on dose. A small natural "neutron background" flux of free neutrons exists on Earth, caused by cosmic ray showers, and by the natural radioactivity of spontaneously fissionable elements in the Earth's crust.

Neutrons in an atomic nucleus edit

An atomic nucleus is formed by a number of protons, Z (the atomic number), and a number of neutrons, N (the neutron number), bound together by the nuclear force. Protons and neutrons each have a mass of approximately one dalton. The atomic number determines the chemical properties of the atom, and the neutron number determines the isotope or nuclide.[7] The terms isotope and nuclide are often used synonymously, but they refer to chemical and nuclear properties, respectively. Isotopes are nuclides with the same atomic number, but different neutron number. Nuclides with the same neutron number, but different atomic number, are called isotones. The atomic mass number, A, is equal to the sum of atomic and neutron numbers. Nuclides with the same atomic mass number, but different atomic and neutron numbers, are called isobars. The mass of a nucleus is always slightly less than the sum of its proton and neutron masses: the difference in mass represents the mass equivalent to nuclear binding energy, the energy which would need to be added to take the nucleus apart.[8]: 822 

The nucleus of the most common isotope of the hydrogen atom (with the chemical symbol 1H) is a lone proton. The nuclei of the heavy hydrogen isotopes deuterium (D or 2H) and tritium (T or 3H) contain one proton bound to one and two neutrons, respectively. All other types of atomic nuclei are composed of two or more protons and various numbers of neutrons. The most common nuclide of the common chemical element lead, 208Pb, has 82 protons and 126 neutrons, for example. The table of nuclides comprises all the known nuclides. Even though it is not a chemical element, the neutron is included in this table.[9]

 
Nuclear fission caused by absorption of a neutron by uranium-235. The heavy nuclide fragments into lighter components and additional neutrons.

Protons and neutrons behave almost identically under the influence of the nuclear force within the nucleus. They are therefore both referred to collectively as nucleons.[10] The concept of isospin, in which the proton and neutron are viewed as two quantum states of the same particle, is used to model the interactions of nucleons by the nuclear or weak forces. Because of the strength of the nuclear force at short distances, the nuclear energy binding nucleons is more than seven orders of magnitude larger than the electromagnetic energy binding electrons in atoms. Nuclear reactions (such as nuclear fission) therefore have an energy density that is more than ten million times that of chemical reactions. Ultimately, the ability of the nuclear force to store energy arising from the electromagnetic repulsion of nuclear components is the basis for most of the energy that makes nuclear reactors or bombs possible. In nuclear fission, the absorption of a neutron by a heavy nuclide (e.g., uranium-235) causes the nuclide to become unstable and break into light nuclides and additional neutrons. The positively charged light nuclides then repel, releasing electromagnetic potential energy.

Beta decay edit

Main article: Beta decay

Neutrons and protons within a nucleus behave similarly and can exchange their identities by similar reactions. These reactions are a form of radioactive decay known as beta decay. Beta decay, in which neutrons decay to protons, or vice versa, is governed by the weak force, and it requires the emission or absorption of electrons and neutrinos, or their antiparticles. The neutron and proton decay reactions are:


n0
 →
p+
 +
e−
 +
ν
e

where
p+
,
e−
, and
ν
e denote the proton, electron and electron anti-neutrino decay products,[11] and


p+
 →
n0
 +
e+
 +
ν
e

where
n0
,
e+
, and
ν
e denote the neutron, positron and electron neutrino decay products.

The electron and positron produced in these reactions are historically known as beta particles, denoted β− or β+ respectively, lending the name to the decay process. In these reactions, the original particle is not composed of the product particles; rather, the product particles are created at the instant of the reaction.

The "free" neutron edit

Main article: Free neutron decay

"Free" neutrons or protons are nucleons that exist independently, free of any nucleus.

The free neutron has a mass of 939565413.3 eV/c2, or 1.674927471×10−27 kg, or 1.00866491588 Da.[4] The neutron has a mean square radius of about 0.8×10−15 m, or 0.8 fm,[12] and it is a spin-½ fermion.[13] The neutron has no measurable electric charge. With its positive electric charge, the proton is directly influenced by electric fields, whereas the neutron is unaffected by electric fields. But the neutron has a magnetic moment, so the neutron is influenced by magnetic fields. The specific properties of the neutron are described below in the Intrinsic properties section.

Outside the nucleus, free neutrons are unstable and have a mean lifetime of 879.6±0.8 s (about 14 minutes, 40 seconds) by beta decay; therefore the half-life for this process (which differs from the mean lifetime by a factor of ln(2) = 0.693) is 610.1±0.7 s (about 10 minutes, 10 seconds).[14][15] This decay, which produces a proton, an electron and electron anti-neutrino, is possible because the mass of the neutron is slightly greater than that of the proton. By the mass-energy equivalence, when a neutron decays to a proton this way, a lower energy state is attained.

For the free neutron the decay energy for this process (based on the masses of the neutron, proton, and electron) is 0.782343 MeV. By comparison the mass energy of the neutron is 939.6 MeV. The maximal energy of the beta decay electron (in the process wherein the neutrino receives a vanishingly small amount of kinetic energy) has been measured at 0.782±0.013 MeV.[16] The latter number is not well-enough measured to determine the comparatively tiny rest mass of the neutrino (which must in theory be subtracted from the maximal electron kinetic energy). The neutrino mass is better constrained by many other methods.

The decay of a free proton to a more massive neutron is energetically disallowed. A high-energy collision of a proton and an electron or neutrino can result in a neutron, however.

A small fraction (about one in 1000) of free neutrons decay with the same products, but add an extra particle in the form of an emitted gamma ray:


n0
 →
p+
 +
e−
 +
ν
e +
γ

This gamma ray may be thought of as an "internal bremsstrahlung" that arises from the electromagnetic interaction of the emitted beta particle with the proton. Internal bremsstrahlung gamma ray production is also a minor feature of beta decays of bound neutrons (as discussed below).

 
A schematic of the nucleus of an atom indicating
β−
 radiation, the emission of a fast electron from the nucleus (the accompanying antineutrino is omitted). In the Rutherford model for the nucleus, red spheres were protons with positive charge and blue spheres were protons tightly bound to an electron with no net charge.
The inset shows beta decay of a free neutron as it is understood today; an electron and antineutrino are created in this process.

A very small minority of neutron decays (about four per million) are so-called "two-body (neutron) decays", in which a proton, electron and antineutrino are produced as usual, but the electron fails to gain the 13.6 eV necessary energy to escape the proton (the ionization energy of hydrogen), and therefore simply remains bound to it, forming a neutral hydrogen atom (one of the "two bodies"). In this type of free neutron decay, almost all of the neutron decay energy is carried off by the antineutrino (the other "body"). (The hydrogen atom recoils with a speed of only about (decay energy)/(hydrogen rest energy) times the speed of light, or 250 km/s.)

Neutrons and protons bound in a nucleus edit

Main articles: Atomic nucleus and Nuclear physics
See also: Valley of stability, Beta-decay stable isobars, and Neutron emission

Neutrons are a necessary constituent of any atomic nucleus that contains more than one proton. As a result of their positive charges, interacting protons have a mutual electromagnetic repulsion that is stronger than their attractive nuclear interaction, so proton-only nuclei are unstable (see diproton and neutron–proton ratio).[17] Neutrons bind with protons and one another in the nucleus via the nuclear force, effectively moderating the repulsive forces between the protons and stabilizing the nucleus.

While a free neutron has a half life of about 10.2 min and a free proton is stable, within nuclei neutrons are often stable and protons are sometimes unstable. When bound within a nucleus, nucleons can decay by the beta decay process. The neutrons and protons in a nucleus form a quantum mechanical system according to the nuclear shell model. Protons and neutrons of a nuclide are organized into discrete hierarchical energy levels with unique quantum numbers. Nucleon decay within a nucleus can occur if allowed by basic energy conservation and quantum mechanical constraints. The decay products, that is, the emitted particles, carry away the energy excess as a nucleon falls from one quantum state to one with less energy, while the neutron (or proton) changes to a proton (or neutron).

For a neutron to decay, the resulting proton requires an available state at lower energy than the initial neutron state. In stable nuclei the possible lower energy states are all filled, meaning each state is occupied by a pair of protons, one with spin up, another with spin down. When all available proton states are filled, the Pauli exclusion principle disallows the decay of a neutron to a proton within stable nuclei. The situation is similar to electrons of an atom, where electrons that occupy distinct atomic orbitals are prevented by the exclusion principle from decaying to lower, already-filled, energy states, with the emission of a photon. The stability of nuclei and nuclide radioactivity are consequences of these constraints.

One example of the decay of a neutron within a nuclide is the carbon isotope carbon-14, which has 6 protons and 8 neutrons. With its excess of neutrons, this isotope decays by beta decay to nitrogen-14 (7 protons, 7 neutrons) with a half-life of about 5,730 years. The decay emits an electron and an electron anti-neutrino. Nitrogen-14 is stable, since none of its protons or neutrons have available quantum states of lesser energy.

The transformation of a proton to a neutron inside of a nucleus is also possible through electron capture:


p+
 +
e−
 →
n0
 +
ν
e

Positron capture by neutrons in nuclei that contain an excess of neutrons is also possible, but is hindered because positrons are both relatively rare in ordinary matter and quickly annihilate when they encounter electrons (which are much less rare) and in any case are repelled by the positive nucleus. Similar, but far more rare, reactions involve the capture of a neutrino by a nucleon in inverse beta decay.

Competition of beta decay types edit

Three types of beta decay in competition are illustrated by the single isotope copper-64 (29 protons, 35 neutrons), which has a half-life of about 12.7 hours. This isotope has one unpaired proton and one unpaired neutron, so either the proton or the neutron can decay. This particular nuclide is almost equally likely to undergo proton decay (by positron emission, 18% or by electron capture, 43%; both forming 64
Ni
) or neutron decay (by electron emission, 39%; forming 64
Zn
).

The neutron in elementary particle physics - the Standard Model edit

 
The principal Feynman diagram for
β−
 decay of a neutron into a proton, electron, and electron antineutrino via an intermediate heavy
W−
 boson.
 
The principal Feynman diagram for
β+
 decay of a proton into a neutron, positron, and electron neutrino via an intermediate heavy
W+
 boson.
Main article: Standard Model

Within the theoretical framework of Standard Model for particle physics, a neutron comprises two down quarks with charge −1/3e and one up quark with charge +2/3e.. The neutron is therefore a composite particle classified as a hadron. The neutron is also classified as a baryon, because it is composed of three valence quarks.[18] The finite size of the neutron and its magnetic moment both indicate that the neutron is a composite, rather than elementary, particle.

The quarks of the neutron are held together by the strong force, mediated by gluons.[19] The nuclear force results from secondary effects of the more fundamental strong force.

The only possible decay mode for the neutron that conserves baryon number is for one of the neutron's quarks to change flavour via the weak interaction. The decay of one of the neutron's down quarks into a lighter up quark can be achieved by the emission of a W boson. By this process, the Standard Model description of beta decay, the neutron decays into a proton (which contains one down and two up quarks), an electron, and an electron antineutrino.

The decay of the proton to a neutron occurs similarly through the weak force. The decay of one of the proton's up quarks into a down quark can be achieved by the emission of a W boson. The proton decays into a neutron, a positron, and an electron neutrino. This reaction can only occur within an atomic nucleus which has a quantum state at lower energy available for the created neutron.

Discovery edit

Main article: Discovery of the neutron

The story of the discovery of the neutron and its properties is central to the extraordinary developments in atomic physics that occurred in the first half of the 20th century, leading ultimately to the atomic bomb in 1945. In the 1911 Rutherford model, the atom consisted of a small positively charged massive nucleus surrounded by a much larger cloud of negatively charged electrons. In 1920, Ernest Rutherford suggested that the nucleus consisted of positive protons and neutrally charged particles, suggested to be a proton and an electron bound in some way.[20] Electrons were assumed to reside within the nucleus because it was known that beta radiation consisted of electrons emitted from the nucleus.[20] About the time Rutherford suggested the neutral proton-electron composite, several other publications appeared making similar suggestions, and in 1921 the American chemist W. D. Harkins first named the hypothetical particle a "neutron".[21][22] The name derives from the Latin root for neutralis (neuter) and the Greek suffix -on (a suffix used in the names of subatomic particles, i.e. electron and proton).[23][24] References to the word neutron in connection with the atom can be found in the literature as early as 1899, however.[22]

Throughout the 1920s, physicists assumed that the atomic nucleus was composed of protons and "nuclear electrons",[25][26] but this raised obvious problems. It was difficult to reconcile the proton–electron model of the nucleus with the Heisenberg uncertainty relation of quantum mechanics.[27][28] The Klein paradox,[29] discovered by Oskar Klein in 1928, presented further quantum mechanical objections to the notion of an electron confined within a nucleus.[27] Observed properties of atoms and molecules were inconsistent with the nuclear spin expected from the proton–electron hypothesis. Both protons and electrons carry an intrinsic spin of 1/2ħ. Isotopes of the same species (i.e. having the same number of protons) can have both integer or fractional spin, i.e. the neutron spin must be also fractional (1/2ħ). But there is no way to arrange the spins of an electron and a proton (supposed to bond to form a neutron) to get the fractional spin of a neutron.

In 1931, Walther Bothe and Herbert Becker found that if alpha particle radiation from polonium fell on beryllium, boron, or lithium, an unusually penetrating radiation was produced. The radiation was not influenced by an electric field, so Bothe and Becker assumed it was gamma radiation.[30][31] The following year Irène Joliot-Curie and Frédéric Joliot-Curie in Paris showed that if this "gamma" radiation fell on paraffin, or any other hydrogen-containing compound, it ejected protons of very high energy.[32] Neither Rutherford nor James Chadwick at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge were convinced by the gamma ray interpretation.[33] Chadwick quickly performed a series of experiments that showed that the new radiation consisted of uncharged particles with about the same mass as the proton.[34][35][36] These properties matched Rutherford's hypothesized neutron. Chadwick won the 1935 Nobel Prize in Physics for this discovery.[2]

 
Models depicting the nucleus and electron energy levels in hydrogen, helium, lithium, and neon atoms. In reality, the diameter of the nucleus is about 100,000 times smaller than the diameter of the atom.

Models for an atomic nucleus consisting of protons and neutrons were quickly developed by Werner Heisenberg[37][38][39] and others.[40][41] The proton–neutron model explained the puzzle of nuclear spins. The origins of beta radiation were explained by Enrico Fermi in 1934 by the process of beta decay, in which the neutron decays to a proton by creating an electron and a (at the time undiscovered) neutrino.[42] In 1935, Chadwick and his doctoral student Maurice Goldhaber reported the first accurate measurement of the mass of the neutron.[43][44]

By 1934, Fermi had bombarded heavier elements with neutrons to induce radioactivity in elements of high atomic number. In 1938, Fermi received the Nobel Prize in Physics "for his demonstrations of the existence of new radioactive elements produced by neutron irradiation, and for his related discovery of nuclear reactions brought about by slow neutrons".[45] In December 1938 Otto Hahn, Lise Meitner, and Fritz Strassmann discovered nuclear fission, or the fractionation of uranium nuclei into lighter elements, induced by neutron bombardment.[46][47][48][49] In 1945 Hahn received the 1944 Nobel Prize in Chemistry "for his discovery of the fission of heavy atomic nuclei".[50][51][52]

The discovery of nuclear fission would lead to the development of nuclear power and the atomic bomb by the end of World War II. It was quickly realized that, if a fission event produced neutrons, each of these neutrons might cause further fission events, in a cascade known as a nuclear chain reaction.[7] These events and findings led Fermi to construct the Chicago Pile-1 at the University of Chicago in 1942, the first self-sustaining nuclear reactor. Just three years later the Manhattan Project was able to test the first atomic bomb, the Trinity nuclear test in July 1945.

Intrinsic properties edit

Mass edit

The mass of a neutron cannot be directly determined by mass spectrometry since it has no electric charge. But since the masses of a proton and of a deuteron can be measured with a mass spectrometer, the mass of a neutron can be deduced by subtracting proton mass from deuteron mass, with the difference being the mass of the neutron plus the binding energy of deuterium (expressed as a positive emitted energy). The latter can be directly measured by measuring the energy ( ) of the single 2.224 MeV gamma photon emitted when a deuteron is formed by a proton capturing a neutron (this is exothermic and happens with zero-energy neutrons). The small recoil kinetic energy ( ) of the deuteron (about 0.06% of the total energy) must also be accounted for.

 

The energy of the gamma ray can be measured to high precision by X-ray diffraction techniques, as was first done by Bell and Elliot in 1948. The best modern (1986) values for neutron mass by this technique are provided by Greene, et al.[53] These give a neutron mass of:

mneutron = 1.008644904(14) Da

The value for the neutron mass in MeV is less accurately known, due to less accuracy in the known conversion of Da to MeV/c2:[54]

mneutron = 939.56563(28) MeV/c2.

Another method to determine the mass of a neutron starts from the beta decay of the neutron, when the momenta of the resulting proton and electron are measured.

Spin edit

The neutron is a spin 1/2 particle, that is, it is a fermion with intrinsic angular momentum equal to 1/2 ħ, where ħ is the reduced Planck constant. For many years after the discovery of the neutron, its exact spin was ambiguous. Although it was assumed to be a spin 1/2 Dirac particle, the possibility that the neutron was a spin 3/2 particle lingered. The interactions of the neutron's magnetic moment with an external magnetic field were exploited to finally determine the spin of the neutron.[55] In 1949, Hughes and Burgy measured neutrons reflected from a ferromagnetic mirror and found that the angular distribution of the reflections was consistent with spin 1/2.[56] In 1954, Sherwood, Stephenson, and Bernstein employed neutrons in a Stern–Gerlach experiment that used a magnetic field to separate the neutron spin states. They recorded two such spin states, consistent with a spin 1/2 particle.[55][57]

As a fermion, the neutron is subject to the Pauli exclusion principle; two neutrons cannot have the same quantum numbers. This is the source of the degeneracy pressure which counteracts gravity in neutron stars and prevents them from forming black holes.[58]

See also: Delta baryon

Magnetic moment edit

Main article: Nucleon magnetic moment

Even though the neutron is a neutral particle, the magnetic moment of a neutron is not zero. The neutron is not affected by electric fields, but it is affected by magnetic fields. The value for the neutron's magnetic moment was first directly measured by Luis Alvarez and Felix Bloch at Berkeley, California, in 1940.[59] Alvarez and Bloch determined the magnetic moment of the neutron to be μn= −1.93(2) μN, where μN is the nuclear magneton. The neutron's magnetic moment has a negative value, because its orientation is opposite to the neutron's spin.[60]

The magnetic moment of the neutron is an indication of its quark substructure and internal charge distribution.[61] In the quark model for hadrons, the neutron is composed of one up quark (charge +2/3 e) and two down quarks (charge −1/3 e).[61] The magnetic moment of the neutron can be modeled as a sum of the magnetic moments of the constituent quarks.[62] The calculation assumes that the quarks behave like pointlike Dirac particles, each having their own magnetic moment. Simplistically, the magnetic moment of the neutron can be viewed as resulting from the vector sum of the three quark magnetic moments, plus the orbital magnetic moments caused by the movement of the three charged quarks within the neutron.

In one of the early successes of the Standard Model, in 1964 Mirza A.B. Beg, Benjamin W. Lee, and Abraham Pais calculated the ratio of proton to neutron magnetic moments to be −3/2 (or a ratio of −1.5), which agrees with the experimental value to within 3%.[63][64][65] The measured value for this ratio is −1.45989805(34).[4]

The above treatment compares neutrons with protons, allowing the complex behavior of quarks to be subtracted out between models, and merely exploring what the effects would be of differing quark charges (or quark type). Such calculations are enough to show that the interior of neutrons is very much like that of protons, save for the difference in quark composition with a down quark in the neutron replacing an up quark in the proton.

The neutron magnetic moment can be roughly computed by assuming a simple nonrelativistic, quantum mechanical wavefunction for baryons composed of three quarks. A straightforward calculation gives fairly accurate estimates for the magnetic moments of neutrons, protons, and other baryons.[62] For a neutron, the result of this calculation is that the magnetic moment of the neutron is given by μn= 4/3 μd − 1/3 μu, where μd and μu are the magnetic moments for the down and up quarks, respectively. This result combines the intrinsic magnetic moments of the quarks with their orbital magnetic moments, and assumes the three quarks are in a particular, dominant quantum state.

Baryon Magnetic moment
of quark model 		Computed
( ) 		Observed
( )
p 4/3 μu − 1/3 μd 2.79 2.793
n 4/3 μd − 1/3 μu −1.86 −1.913

The results of this calculation are encouraging, but the masses of the up or down quarks were assumed to be 1/3 the mass of a nucleon.[62] The masses of the quarks are actually only about 1% that of a nucleon.[66] The discrepancy stems from the complexity of the Standard Model for nucleons, where most of their mass originates in the gluon fields, virtual particles, and their associated energy that are essential aspects of the strong force.[66][67] Furthermore, the complex system of quarks and gluons that constitute a neutron requires a relativistic treatment.[68] But the nucleon magnetic moment has been successfully computed numerically from first principles, including all of the effects mentioned and using more realistic values for the quark masses. The calculation gave results that were in fair agreement with measurement, but it required significant computing resources.[69][70]

Electric charge edit

The total electric charge of the neutron is 0 e. This zero value has been tested experimentally, and the present experimental limit for the charge of the neutron is −2(8)×10−22 e,[6] or −3(13)×10−41 C. This value is consistent with zero, given the experimental uncertainties (indicated in parentheses). By comparison, the charge of the proton is +1 e.

Structure and geometry of charge distribution edit

An article published in 2007 featuring a model-independent analysis concluded that the neutron has a negatively charged exterior, a positively charged middle, and a negative core.[71] In a simplified classical view, the negative "skin" of the neutron assists it to be attracted to the protons with which it interacts in the nucleus; but the main attraction between neutrons and protons is via the nuclear force, which does not involve electric charge.

The simplified classical view of the neutron's charge distribution also "explains" the fact that the neutron magnetic dipole points in the opposite direction from its spin angular momentum vector (as compared to the proton). This gives the neutron, in effect, a magnetic moment which resembles a negatively charged particle. This can be reconciled classically with a neutral neutron composed of a charge distribution in which the negative sub-parts of the neutron have a larger average radius of distribution, and therefore contribute more to the particle's magnetic dipole moment, than do the positive parts that are, on average, nearer the core.

Electric dipole moment edit

Main article: Neutron electric dipole moment

The Standard Model of particle physics predicts a tiny separation of positive and negative charge within the neutron leading to a permanent electric dipole moment.[72] But the predicted value is well below the current sensitivity of experiments. From several unsolved puzzles in particle physics, it is clear that the Standard Model is not the final and full description of all particles and their interactions. New theories going beyond the Standard Model generally lead to much larger predictions for the electric dipole moment of the neutron. Currently, there are at least four experiments trying to measure for the first time a finite neutron electric dipole moment, including:

Antineutron edit

Main article: Antineutron

The antineutron is the antiparticle of the neutron. It was discovered by Bruce Cork in 1956, a year after the antiproton was discovered. CPT-symmetry puts strong constraints on the relative properties of particles and antiparticles, so studying antineutrons provides stringent tests on CPT-symmetry. The fractional difference in the masses of the neutron and antineutron is (9±6)×10−5. Since the difference is only about two standard deviations away from zero, this does not give any convincing evidence of CPT-violation.[14]

Neutron compounds edit

Dineutrons and tetraneutrons edit

Main articles: Dineutron and Tetraneutron

The dineutron is considered an unbound isotope with lifetimes around 10-22 seconds. The first evidence for this state was reported by Haddock et al. in 1965.[78]: 275  In 2012, Artemis Spyrou from Michigan State University and coworkers reported that they observed, for the first time, direct dineutron emission in the decay of 16Be. The dineutron character is evidenced by a small emission angle between the two neutrons. The authors measured the two-neutron separation energy to be 1.35(10) MeV, in good agreement with shell model calculations, using standard interactions for this mass region.[79]

Evidence for unbound clusters of 4 neutrons, or tetraneutron as resonances in the disintegration of beryllium-14 nuclei,[80] in 8He-8Be interactions,[81] and collisions of 4He nuclei give an estimated lifetime around 10-22 seconds.[82] These discoveries should deepen our understanding of the nuclear forces.[83][84]

Neutron stars and neutron matter edit

Main articles: Neutron matter and Neutron star

At extremely high pressures and temperatures, nucleons and electrons are believed to collapse into bulk neutronic matter, called neutron matter. This is presumed to happen in neutron stars.[85]

The extreme pressure inside a neutron star may deform the neutrons into a cubic symmetry, allowing tighter packing of neutrons.[86]

Detection edit

Main article: Neutron detection

The common means of detecting a charged particle by looking for a track of ionization (such as in a cloud chamber) does not work for neutrons directly. Neutrons that elastically scatter off atoms can create an ionization track that is detectable, but the experiments are not as simple to carry out; other means for detecting neutrons, consisting of allowing them to interact with atomic nuclei, are more commonly used. The commonly used methods to detect neutrons can therefore be categorized according to the nuclear processes relied upon, mainly neutron capture or elastic scattering.[87]

Neutron detection by neutron capture edit

A common method for detecting neutrons involves converting the energy released from neutron capture reactions into electrical signals. Certain nuclides have a high neutron capture cross section, which is the probability of absorbing a neutron. Upon neutron capture, the compound nucleus emits more easily detectable radiation, for example an alpha particle, which is then detected. The nuclides 3
He
, 6
Li
, 10
B
, 233
U
, 235
U
, 237
Np
, and 239
Pu
 are useful for this purpose.

Neutron detection by elastic scattering edit

Neutrons can elastically scatter off nuclei, causing the struck nucleus to recoil. Kinematically, a neutron can transfer more energy to a light nucleus such as hydrogen or helium than to a heavier nucleus. Detectors relying on elastic scattering are called fast neutron detectors. Recoiling nuclei can ionize and excite further atoms through collisions. Charge and/or scintillation light produced in this way can be collected to produce a detected signal. A major challenge in fast neutron detection is discerning such signals from erroneous signals produced by gamma radiation in the same detector. Methods such as pulse shape discrimination can be used in distinguishing neutron signals from gamma-ray signals, although certain inorganic scintillator-based detectors have been developed [88][89] to selectively detect neutrons in mixed radiation fields inherently without any additional techniques.

Fast neutron detectors have the advantage of not requiring a moderator, and are therefore capable of measuring the neutron's energy, time of arrival, and in certain cases direction of incidence.

Sources and production edit

Main articles: Neutron source, Neutron generator, and Research reactor

Free neutrons are unstable, although they have the longest half-life of any unstable subatomic particle by several orders of magnitude. Their half-life is still only about 10 minutes, so they can be obtained only from sources that produce them continuously.

Natural neutron background. A small natural background flux of free neutrons exists everywhere on Earth.[90] In the atmosphere and deep into the ocean, the "neutron background" is caused by muons produced by cosmic ray interaction with the atmosphere. These high-energy muons are capable of penetration to considerable depths in water and soil. There, in striking atomic nuclei, among other reactions they induce spallation reactions in which a neutron is liberated from the nucleus. Within the Earth's crust a second source is neutrons produced primarily by spontaneous fission of uranium and thorium present in crustal minerals. The neutron background is not strong enough to be a biological hazard, but it is of importance to very high resolution particle detectors that are looking for very rare events, such as (hypothesized) interactions that might be caused by particles of dark matter.[90] Recent research has shown that even thunderstorms can produce neutrons with energies of up to several tens of MeV.[91] Recent research has shown that the fluence of these neutrons lies between 10−9 and 10−13 per ms and per m2 depending on the detection altitude. The energy of most of these neutrons, even with initial energies of 20 MeV, decreases down to the keV range within 1 ms.[92]

Even stronger neutron background radiation is produced at the surface of Mars, where the atmosphere is thick enough to generate neutrons from cosmic ray muon production and neutron-spallation, but not thick enough to provide significant protection from the neutrons produced. These neutrons not only produce a Martian surface neutron radiation hazard from direct downward-going neutron radiation but may also produce a significant hazard from reflection of neutrons from the Martian surface, which will produce reflected neutron radiation penetrating upward into a Martian craft or habitat from the floor.[93]

Sources of neutrons for research. These include certain types of radioactive decay (spontaneous fission and neutron emission), and from certain nuclear reactions. Convenient nuclear reactions include tabletop reactions such as natural alpha and gamma bombardment of certain nuclides, often beryllium or deuterium, and induced nuclear fission, such as occurs in nuclear reactors. In addition, high-energy nuclear reactions (such as occur in cosmic radiation showers or accelerator collisions) also produce neutrons from disintegration of target nuclei. Small (tabletop) particle accelerators optimized to produce free neutrons in this way, are called neutron generators.

In practice, the most commonly used small laboratory sources of neutrons use radioactive decay to power neutron production. One noted neutron-producing radioisotope, californium-252 decays (half-life 2.65 years) by spontaneous fission 3% of the time with production of 3.7 neutrons per fission, and is used alone as a neutron source from this process. Nuclear reaction sources (that involve two materials) powered by radioisotopes use an alpha decay source plus a beryllium target, or else a source of high-energy gamma radiation from a source that undergoes beta decay followed by gamma decay, which produces photoneutrons on interaction of the high-energy gamma ray with ordinary stable beryllium, or else with the deuterium in heavy water. A popular source of the latter type is radioactive antimony-124 plus beryllium, a system with a half-life of 60.9 days, which can be constructed from natural antimony (which is 42.8% stable antimony-123) by activating it with neutrons in a nuclear reactor, then transported to where the neutron source is needed.[94]

 
Institut Laue–Langevin (ILL) in Grenoble, France – a major neutron research facility.

Nuclear fission reactors naturally produce free neutrons; their role is to sustain the energy-producing chain reaction. The intense neutron radiation can also be used to produce various radioisotopes through the process of neutron activation, which is a type of neutron capture.

Experimental nuclear fusion reactors produce free neutrons as a waste product. But it is these neutrons that possess most of the energy, and converting that energy to a useful form has proved a difficult engineering challenge. Fusion reactors that generate neutrons are likely to create radioactive waste, but the waste is composed of neutron-activated lighter isotopes, which have relatively short (50–100 years) decay periods as compared to typical half-lives of 10,000 years[95] for fission waste, which is long due primarily to the long half-life of alpha-emitting transuranic actinides.[96] Some nuclear fusion-fission hybrids are proposed to make use of those neutrons to either maintain a subcritical reactor or to aid in nuclear transmutation of harmful long lived nuclear waste to shorter lived or stable nuclides.

Neutron beams and modification of beams after production edit

Free neutron beams are obtained from neutron sources by neutron transport. For access to intense neutron sources, researchers must go to a specialized neutron facility that operates a research reactor or a spallation source.

The neutron's lack of total electric charge makes it difficult to steer or accelerate them. Charged particles can be accelerated, decelerated, or deflected by electric or magnetic fields. These methods have little effect on neutrons. But some effects may be attained by use of inhomogeneous magnetic fields because of the neutron's magnetic moment. Neutrons can be controlled by methods that include moderation, reflection, and velocity selection. Thermal neutrons can be polarized by transmission through magnetic materials in a method analogous to the Faraday effect for photons. Cold neutrons of wavelengths of 6–7 angstroms can be produced in beams of a high degree of polarization, by use of magnetic mirrors and magnetized interference filters.[97]

Applications edit

The neutron plays an important role in many nuclear reactions. For example, neutron capture often results in neutron activation, inducing radioactivity. In particular, knowledge of neutrons and their behavior has been important in the development of nuclear reactors and nuclear weapons. The fissioning of elements like uranium-235 and plutonium-239 is caused by their absorption of neutrons.

Cold, thermal, and hot neutron radiation is commonly employed in neutron scattering facilities for neutron diffraction, small-angle neutron scattering, and neutron reflectometry. Slow neutron matter waves exhibit properties similar to geometrical and wave optics of light, including reflection, refraction, diffraction, and interference.[98] Neutrons are complementary to X-rays in terms of atomic contrasts by different scattering cross sections; sensitivity to magnetism; energy range for inelastic neutron spectroscopy; and deep penetration into matter.

The development of "neutron lenses" based on total internal reflection within hollow glass capillary tubes or by reflection from dimpled aluminum plates has driven ongoing research into neutron microscopy and neutron/gamma ray tomography.[99][100][101][102]

A major use of neutrons is to excite delayed and prompt gamma rays from elements in materials. This forms the basis of neutron activation analysis (NAA) and prompt gamma neutron activation analysis (PGNAA). NAA is most often used to analyze small samples of materials in a nuclear reactor whilst PGNAA is most often used to analyze subterranean rocks around bore holes and industrial bulk materials on conveyor belts.

Another use of neutron emitters is the detection of light nuclei, in particular the hydrogen found in water molecules. When a fast neutron collides with a light nucleus, it loses a large fraction of its energy. By measuring the rate at which slow neutrons return to the probe after reflecting off of hydrogen nuclei, a neutron probe may determine the water content in soil.

Medical therapies edit

Main articles: Fast neutron therapy and Neutron capture therapy of cancer

Because neutron radiation is both penetrating and ionizing, it can be exploited for medical treatments. However, neutron radiation can have the unfortunate side-effect of leaving the affected area radioactive. Neutron tomography is therefore not a viable medical application.

Fast neutron therapy uses high-energy neutrons typically greater than 20 MeV to treat cancer. Radiation therapy of cancers is based upon the biological response of cells to ionizing radiation. If radiation is delivered in small sessions to damage cancerous areas, normal tissue will have time to repair itself, while tumor cells often cannot.[103] Neutron radiation can deliver energy to a cancerous region at a rate an order of magnitude larger than gamma radiation.[104]

Beams of low-energy neutrons are used in boron neutron capture therapy to treat cancer. In boron neutron capture therapy, the patient is given a drug that contains boron and that preferentially accumulates in the tumor to be targeted. The tumor is then bombarded with very low-energy neutrons (although often higher than thermal energy) which are captured by the boron-10 isotope in the boron, which produces an excited state of boron-11 that then decays to produce lithium-7 and an alpha particle that have sufficient energy to kill the malignant cell, but insufficient range to damage nearby cells. For such a therapy to be applied to the treatment of cancer, a neutron source having an intensity of the order of a thousand million (109) neutrons per second per cm2 is preferred. Such fluxes require a research nuclear reactor.

Protection edit

Exposure to free neutrons can be hazardous, since the interaction of neutrons with molecules in the body can cause disruption to molecules and atoms, and can also cause reactions that give rise to other forms of radiation (such as protons).[7] The normal precautions of radiation protection apply: Avoid exposure, stay as far from the source as possible, and keep exposure time to a minimum. But particular thought must be given to how to protect from neutron exposure. For other types of radiation, e.g., alpha particles, beta particles, or gamma rays, material of a high atomic number and with high density makes for good shielding; frequently, lead is used. However, this approach will not work with neutrons, since the absorption of neutrons does not increase straightforwardly with atomic number, as it does with alpha, beta, and gamma radiation. Instead one needs to look at the particular interactions neutrons have with matter (see the section on detection above). For example, hydrogen-rich materials are often used to shield against neutrons, since ordinary hydrogen both scatters and slows neutrons. This often means that simple concrete blocks or even paraffin-loaded plastic blocks afford better protection from neutrons than do far more dense materials. After slowing, neutrons may then be absorbed with an isotope that has high affinity for slow neutrons without causing secondary capture radiation, such as lithium-6.

Hydrogen-rich ordinary water effects neutron absorption in nuclear fission reactors: Usually, neutrons are so strongly absorbed by normal water that fuel enrichment with a fissionable isotope is required. (The number of neutrons produced per fission depends primarily on the fission products. The average is roughly 2.5 to 3.0 and at least one, on average, must evade capture in order to sustain the nuclear chain reaction.) The deuterium in heavy water has a very much lower absorption affinity for neutrons than does protium (normal light hydrogen). Deuterium is, therefore, used in CANDU-type reactors, in order to slow (moderate) neutron velocity, to increase the probability of nuclear fission compared to neutron capture.

Neutron temperature edit

Main article: Neutron temperature

Thermal neutrons edit

Thermal neutrons are free neutrons whose energies have a Maxwell–Boltzmann distribution with kT = 0.0253 eV (4.0×10−21 J) at room temperature. This gives characteristic (not average, or median) speed of 2.2 km/s. The name 'thermal' comes from their energy being that of the room temperature gas or material they are permeating. (see kinetic theory for energies and speeds of molecules). After a number of collisions (often in the range of 10–20) with nuclei, neutrons arrive at this energy level, provided that they are not absorbed.

In many substances, thermal neutron reactions show a much larger effective cross-section than reactions involving faster neutrons, and thermal neutrons can therefore be absorbed more readily (i.e., with higher probability) by any atomic nuclei that they collide with, creating a heavier – and often unstable – isotope of the chemical element as a result.

Most fission reactors use a neutron moderator to slow down, or thermalize the neutrons that are emitted by nuclear fission so that they are more easily captured, causing further fission. Others, called fast breeder reactors, use fission energy neutrons directly.

Cold neutrons edit

Cold neutrons are thermal neutrons that have been equilibrated in a very cold substance such as liquid deuterium. Such a cold source is placed in the moderator of a research reactor or spallation source. Cold neutrons are particularly valuable for neutron scattering experiments.[105]

The use of cold and very cold neutrons (VCN) have been a bit limited compared to the use of thermal neutrons due to the relatively lower flux and lack in optical components. However, Innovative solutions have been proposed to offer more options to the scientific community to promote the use of VCN.[106][107]

 
Cold neutron source providing neutrons at about the temperature of liquid hydrogen

Ultracold neutrons edit

Ultracold neutrons are produced by inelastic scattering of cold neutrons in substances with a low neutron absorption cross section at a temperature of a few kelvins, such as solid deuterium[108] or superfluid helium.[109] An alternative production method is the mechanical deceleration of cold neutrons exploiting the Doppler shift.[110][111]

Fission energy neutrons edit

Main article: Nuclear fission

A fast neutron is a free neutron with a kinetic energy level close to 1 MeV (1.6×10−13 J), hence a speed of ~14000 km/s (~ 5% of the speed of light). They are named fission energy or fast neutrons to distinguish them from lower-energy thermal neutrons, and high-energy neutrons produced in cosmic showers or accelerators. Fast neutrons are produced by nuclear processes such as nuclear fission. Neutrons produced in fission, as noted above, have a Maxwell–Boltzmann distribution of kinetic energies from 0 to ~14 MeV, a mean energy of 2 MeV (for 235U fission neutrons), and a mode of only 0.75 MeV, which means that more than half of them do not qualify as fast (and thus have almost no chance of initiating fission in fertile materials, such as 238U and 232Th).

Fast neutrons can be made into thermal neutrons via a process called moderation. This is done with a neutron moderator. In reactors, typically heavy water, light water, or graphite are used to moderate neutrons.

Fusion neutrons edit

 
The fusion reaction rate increases rapidly with temperature until it maximizes and then gradually drops off. The D–T rate peaks at a lower temperature (about 70 keV, or 800 million kelvins) and at a higher value than other reactions commonly considered for fusion energy.
Further information: Nuclear fusion § Criteria and candidates for terrestrial reactions

D–T (deuterium–tritium) fusion is the fusion reaction that produces the most energetic neutrons, with 14.1 MeV of kinetic energy and traveling at 17% of the speed of light. D–T fusion is also the easiest fusion reaction to ignite, reaching near-peak rates even when the deuterium and tritium nuclei have only a thousandth as much kinetic energy as the 14.1 MeV that will be produced.

14.1 MeV neutrons have about 10 times as much energy as fission neutrons, and are very effective at fissioning even non-fissile heavy nuclei, and these high-energy fissions produce more neutrons on average than fissions by lower-energy neutrons. This makes D–T fusion neutron sources such as proposed tokamak power reactors useful for transmutation of transuranic waste. 14.1 MeV neutrons can also produce neutrons by knocking them loose from nuclei.

On the other hand, these very high-energy neutrons are less likely to simply be captured without causing fission or spallation. For these reasons, nuclear weapon design extensively uses D–T fusion 14.1 MeV neutrons to cause more fission. Fusion neutrons are able to cause fission in ordinarily non-fissile materials, such as depleted uranium (uranium-238), and these materials have been used in the jackets of thermonuclear weapons. Fusion neutrons also can cause fission in substances that are unsuitable or difficult to make into primary fission bombs, such as reactor grade plutonium. This physical fact thus causes ordinary non-weapons grade materials to become of concern in certain nuclear proliferation discussions and treaties.

Other fusion reactions produce much less energetic neutrons. D–D fusion produces a 2.45 MeV neutron and helium-3 half of the time, and produces tritium and a proton but no neutron the rest of the time. D–3He fusion produces no neutron.

Intermediate-energy neutrons edit

 
Transmutation flow in light water reactor, which is a thermal-spectrum reactor

A fission energy neutron that has slowed down but not yet reached thermal energies is called an epithermal neutron.

Cross sections for both capture and fission reactions often have multiple resonance peaks at specific energies in the epithermal energy range. These are of less significance in a fast-neutron reactor, where most neutrons are absorbed before slowing down to this range, or in a well-moderated thermal reactor, where epithermal neutrons interact mostly with moderator nuclei, not with either fissile or fertile actinide nuclides. But in a partially moderated reactor with more interactions of epithermal neutrons with heavy metal nuclei, there are greater possibilities for transient changes in reactivity that might make reactor control more difficult.

Ratios of capture reactions to fission reactions are also worse (more captures without fission) in most nuclear fuels such as plutonium-239, making epithermal-spectrum reactors using these fuels less desirable, as captures not only waste the one neutron captured but also usually result in a nuclide that is not fissile with thermal or epithermal neutrons, though still fissionable with fast neutrons. The exception is uranium-233 of the thorium cycle, which has good capture-fission ratios at all neutron energies.

High-energy neutrons edit

High-energy neutrons have much more energy than fission energy neutrons and are generated as secondary particles by particle accelerators or in the atmosphere from cosmic rays. These high-energy neutrons are extremely efficient at ionization and far more likely to cause cell death than X-rays or protons.[112][113]

See also edit

 
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Neutrons.

Neutron sources edit

Processes involving neutrons edit

References edit

  1. ^ Ernest Rutherford 2011-08-03 at the Wayback Machine. Chemed.chem.purdue.edu. Retrieved on 2012-08-16.
  2. ^ a b 1935 Nobel Prize in Physics 2017-10-03 at the Wayback Machine. Nobelprize.org. Retrieved on 2012-08-16.
  3. ^ a b "2018 CODATA recommended values" https://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Constants/index.html 2018-01-22 at the Wayback Machine
  4. ^ a b c d e f Mohr, P.J.; Taylor, B.N. and Newell, D.B. (2014), "The 2014 CODATA Recommended Values of the Fundamental Physical Constants" 2013-10-09 at the Wayback Machine (Web Version 7.0). The database was developed by J. Baker, M. Douma, and S. Kotochigova. (2014). National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, Maryland 20899.
  5. ^ Zyla, P. A. (2020). "n MEAN LIFE". PDG Live: 2020 Review of Particle Physics. Particle Data Group. from the original on 17 January 2021. Retrieved 25 February 2021.
  6. ^ a b Olive, K.A.; (Particle Data Group); et al. (2014). "Review of Particle Physics" (PDF). Chinese Physics C. 38 (9): 1–708. arXiv:1412.1408. Bibcode:2014ChPhC..38i0001O. doi:10.1088/1674-1137/38/9/090001. PMID 10020536. S2CID 118395784. (PDF) from the original on 2020-06-01. Retrieved 2017-10-26.
  7. ^ a b c Glasstone, Samuel; Dolan, Philip J., eds. (1977), The Effects of Nuclear Weapons (3rd ed.), U.S. Dept. of Defense and Energy Research and Development Administration, U.S. Government Printing Office, ISBN 978-1-60322-016-3
  8. ^ Giancoli, Douglas C. (1984). General physics. Englewood Cliffs, N.J: Prentice-Hall. ISBN 978-0-13-350884-0. OCLC 1033640549.
  9. ^ Nudat 2 2009-08-17 at the Wayback Machine. Nndc.bnl.gov. Retrieved on 2010-12-04.
  10. ^ Thomas, A.W.; Weise, W. (2001), The Structure of the Nucleon, Wiley-WCH, Berlin, ISBN 978-3-527-40297-7
  11. ^ Particle Data Group Summary Data Table on Baryons 2011-09-10 at the Wayback Machine. lbl.gov (2007). Retrieved on 2012-08-16.
  12. ^ Povh, B.; Rith, K.; Scholz, C.; Zetsche, F. (2002). Particles and Nuclei: An Introduction to the Physical Concepts. Berlin: Springer-Verlag. p. 73. ISBN 978-3-540-43823-6.
  13. ^ Basdevant, J.-L.; Rich, J.; Spiro, M. (2005). Fundamentals in Nuclear Physics. Springer. p. 155. ISBN 978-0-387-01672-6.
  14. ^ a b Nakamura, K (2010). "Review of Particle Physics". Journal of Physics G. 37 (7A): 1–708. Bibcode:2010JPhG...37g5021N. doi:10.1088/0954-3899/37/7A/075021. hdl:10481/34593. PMID 10020536. PDF with 2011 partial update for the 2012 edition 2012-09-20 at the Wayback Machine. The exact value of the mean lifetime is still uncertain, due to conflicting results from experiments. The Particle Data Group reports values up to six seconds apart (more than four standard deviations), commenting that "our 2006, 2008, and 2010 Reviews stayed with 885.7±0.8 s; but we noted that in light of SEREBROV 05 our value should be regarded as suspect until further experiments clarified matters. Since our 2010 Review, PICHLMAIER 10 has obtained a mean life of 880.7±1.8 s, closer to the value of SEREBROV 05 than to our average. And SEREBROV 10B[...] claims their values should be lowered by about 6 s, which would bring them into line with the two lower values. But those re-evaluations have not received an enthusiastic response from the experimenters in question; and in any case the Particle Data Group would have to await published changes (by those experimenters) of published values. At this point, we can think of nothing better to do than to average the seven best but discordant measurements, getting 881.5±1.5 s. Note that the error includes a scale factor of 2.7. This is a jump of 4.2 old (and 2.8 new) standard deviations. This state of affairs is a particularly unhappy one, because the value is so important. We again call upon the experimenters to clear this up."
  15. ^ Tanabashi, M. (2018). "The Review of Particle Physics". Physical Review D. 54 (1): 1653. doi:10.1103/physrevd.54.1. PMID 10020536. from the original on 2020-10-19. Retrieved 2020-10-14.
  16. ^ Basic Ideas and Concepts in Nuclear Physics: An Introductory Approach, Third Edition; K. Heyde Taylor & Francis 2004. Print ISBN 978-0-7503-0980-6, 978-1-4200-5494-1. doi:10.1201/9781420054941. full text[permanent dead link]
  17. ^ Sir James Chadwick's Discovery of Neutrons 2011-10-26 at the Wayback Machine. ANS Nuclear Cafe. Retrieved on 2012-08-16.
  18. ^ Adair, R.K. (1989). The Great Design: Particles, Fields, and Creation. Oxford University Press. p. 214. Bibcode:1988gdpf.book.....A.
  19. ^ Cottingham, W.N.; Greenwood, D.A. (1986). An Introduction to Nuclear Physics. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521657334.
  20. ^ a b Rutherford, E. (1920). "Nuclear Constitution of Atoms". Proceedings of the Royal Society A. 97 (686): 374–400. Bibcode:1920RSPSA..97..374R. doi:10.1098/rspa.1920.0040.
  21. ^ Harkins, William (1921). "The constitution and stability of atomic nuclei. (A contribution to the subject of inorganic evolution.)". Philos. Mag. 42 (249): 305. doi:10.1080/14786442108633770.
  22. ^ a b Feather, N. (1960). "A history of neutrons and nuclei. Part 1". Contemporary Physics. 1 (3): 191–203. Bibcode:1960ConPh...1..191F. doi:10.1080/00107516008202611.
  23. ^ Pauli, Wolfgang; Hermann, A.; Meyenn, K.v; Weisskopff, V.F (1985). "Das Jahr 1932 die Entdeckung des Neutrons". Wolfgang Pauli. Sources in the History of Mathematics and Physical Sciences. Vol. 6. pp. 105–144. doi:10.1007/978-3-540-78801-0_3. ISBN 978-3-540-13609-5.
  24. ^ Hendry, John, ed. (1984). Cambridge Physics in the Thirties. Bristol: Adam Hilger. ISBN 978-0852747612.
  25. ^ Brown, Laurie M. (1978). "The idea of the neutrino". Physics Today. 31 (9): 23–28. Bibcode:1978PhT....31i..23B. doi:10.1063/1.2995181.
  26. ^ Friedlander G., Kennedy J.W. and Miller J.M. (1964) Nuclear and Radiochemistry (2nd edition), Wiley, pp. 22–23 and 38–39
  27. ^ a b Stuewer, Roger H. (1985). "Niels Bohr and Nuclear Physics". In French, A.P.; Kennedy, P.J. (eds.). Niels Bohr: A Centenary Volume. Harvard University Press. pp. 197–220. ISBN 978-0674624160.
  28. ^ Pais, Abraham (1986). Inward Bound. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 299. ISBN 978-0198519973.
  29. ^ Klein, O. (1929). "Die Reflexion von Elektronen an einem Potentialsprung nach der relativistischen Dynamik von Dirac". Zeitschrift für Physik. 53 (3–4): 157–165. Bibcode:1929ZPhy...53..157K. doi:10.1007/BF01339716. S2CID 121771000.
  30. ^ Bothe, W.; Becker, H. (1930). "Künstliche Erregung von Kern-γ-Strahlen" [Artificial excitation of nuclear γ-radiation]. Zeitschrift für Physik. 66 (5–6): 289–306. Bibcode:1930ZPhy...66..289B. doi:10.1007/BF01390908. S2CID 122888356.
  31. ^ Becker, H.; Bothe, W. (1932). "Die in Bor und Beryllium erregten γ-Strahlen" [Γ-rays excited in boron and beryllium]. Zeitschrift für Physik. 76 (7–8): 421–438. Bibcode:1932ZPhy...76..421B. doi:10.1007/BF01336726. S2CID 121188471.
  32. ^ Joliot-Curie, Irène & Joliot, Frédéric (1932). "Émission de protons de grande vitesse par les substances hydrogénées sous l'influence des rayons γ très pénétrants" [Emission of high-speed protons by hydrogenated substances under the influence of very penetrating γ-rays]. Comptes Rendus. 194: 273. from the original on 2022-03-04. Retrieved 2012-06-16.
  33. ^ Brown, Andrew (1997). The Neutron and the Bomb: A Biography of Sir James Chadwick. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-853992-6.
  34. ^ Chadwick, James (1932). "Possible Existence of a Neutron" (PDF). Nature. 129 (3252): 312. Bibcode:1932Natur.129Q.312C. doi:10.1038/129312a0. S2CID 4076465.
  35. ^ . Rutherford's Nuclear World. American Institute of Physics. 2011–2014. Archived from the original on 21 October 2014. Retrieved 19 August 2014.
  36. ^ Chadwick, J. (1933). "Bakerian Lecture. The Neutron". Proceedings of the Royal Society A. 142 (846): 1–25. Bibcode:1933RSPSA.142....1C. doi:10.1098/rspa.1933.0152.
  37. ^ Heisenberg, W. (1932). "Über den Bau der Atomkerne. I". Zeitschrift für Physik. 77 (1–2): 1–11. Bibcode:1932ZPhy...77....1H. doi:10.1007/BF01342433. S2CID 186218053.
  38. ^ Heisenberg, W. (1932). "Über den Bau der Atomkerne. II". Zeitschrift für Physik. 78 (3–4): 156–164. Bibcode:1932ZPhy...78..156H. doi:10.1007/BF01337585. S2CID 186221789.
  39. ^ Heisenberg, W. (1933). "Über den Bau der Atomkerne. III". Zeitschrift für Physik. 80 (9–10): 587–596. Bibcode:1933ZPhy...80..587H. doi:10.1007/BF01335696. S2CID 126422047.
  40. ^ Iwanenko, D. (1932). "The Neutron Hypothesis". Nature. 129 (3265): 798. Bibcode:1932Natur.129..798I. doi:10.1038/129798d0. S2CID 4096734.
  41. ^ Miller A.I. (1995) Early Quantum Electrodynamics: A Sourcebook, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, ISBN 0521568919, pp. 84–88.
  42. ^ Wilson, Fred L. (1968). "Fermi's Theory of Beta Decay". American Journal of Physics. 36 (12): 1150–1160. Bibcode:1968AmJPh..36.1150W. doi:10.1119/1.1974382.
  43. ^ Chadwick, J.; Goldhaber, M. (1934). "A nuclear photo-effect: disintegration of the diplon by gamma rays". Nature. 134 (3381): 237–238. Bibcode:1934Natur.134..237C. doi:10.1038/134237a0. S2CID 4137231.
  44. ^ Chadwick, J.; Goldhaber, M. (1935). "A nuclear photoelectric effect". Proceedings of the Royal Society of London A. 151 (873): 479–493. Bibcode:1935RSPSA.151..479C. doi:10.1098/rspa.1935.0162.
  45. ^ Cooper, Dan (1999). Enrico Fermi: And the Revolutions in Modern physics. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-511762-2. OCLC 39508200.
  46. ^ Hahn, O. & Strassmann, F. (1939). "Über den Nachweis und das Verhalten der bei der Bestrahlung des Urans mittels Neutronen entstehenden Erdalkalimetalle" [On the detection and characteristics of the alkaline earth metals formed by irradiation of uranium with neutrons]. Die Naturwissenschaften. 27 (1): 11–15. Bibcode:1939NW.....27...11H. doi:10.1007/BF01488241. S2CID 5920336.
  47. ^ Hahn, O. (1958). "The Discovery of Fission". Scientific American. 198 (2): 76–84. Bibcode:1958SciAm.198b..76H. doi:10.1038/scientificamerican0258-76.
  48. ^ Rife, Patricia (1999). Lise Meitner and the dawn of the nuclear age. Basel, Switzerland: Birkhäuser. ISBN 978-0-8176-3732-3.
  49. ^ Hahn, O.; Strassmann, F. (10 February 1939). "Proof of the Formation of Active Isotopes of Barium from Uranium and Thorium Irradiated with Neutrons; Proof of the Existence of More Active Fragments Produced by Uranium Fission". Die Naturwissenschaften. 27 (6): 89–95. Bibcode:1939NW.....27...89H. doi:10.1007/BF01488988. S2CID 33512939.
  50. ^ "The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1944". Nobel Foundation. from the original on 2018-12-26. Retrieved 2007-12-17.
  51. ^ Bernstein, Jeremy (2001). Hitler's uranium club: the secret recordings at Farm Hall. New York: Copernicus. p. 281. ISBN 978-0-387-95089-1.
  52. ^ "The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1944: Presentation Speech". Nobel Foundation. from the original on 2007-10-25. Retrieved 2008-01-03.
  53. ^ Greene, GL; et al. (1986). "New determination of the deuteron binding energy and the neutron mass". Physical Review Letters. 56 (8): 819–822. Bibcode:1986PhRvL..56..819G. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.56.819. PMID 10033294.
  54. ^ Byrne, J. Neutrons, Nuclei, and Matter, Dover Publications, Mineola, New York, 2011, ISBN 0486482383, pp. 18–19
  55. ^ a b J. Byrne (2011). Neutrons, Nuclei and Matter: An exploration of the physics of slow neutrons. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications. pp. 28–31. ISBN 978-0486482385.
  56. ^ Hughes, D.J.; Burgy, M.T. (1949). (PDF). Physical Review. 76 (9): 1413–1414. Bibcode:1949PhRv...76.1413H. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.76.1413. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-08-13. Retrieved 2016-06-26.
  57. ^ Sherwood, J.E.; Stephenson, T.E.; Bernstein, S. (1954). "Stern-Gerlach experiment on polarized neutrons". Physical Review. 96 (6): 1546–1548. Bibcode:1954PhRv...96.1546S. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.96.1546.
  58. ^ Bombaci, I. (1996). "The Maximum Mass of a Neutron Star". Astronomy and Astrophysics. 305: 871–877. Bibcode:1996A&A...305..871B.
  59. ^ Alvarez, L.W; Bloch, F. (1940). "A quantitative determination of the neutron magnetic moment in absolute nuclear magnetons". Physical Review. 57 (2): 111–122. Bibcode:1940PhRv...57..111A. doi:10.1103/physrev.57.111.
  60. ^ Tipler, Paul Allen; Llewellyn, Ralph A. (2002). Modern Physics (4 ed.). Macmillan. p. 310. ISBN 978-0-7167-4345-3. from the original on 2022-04-07. Retrieved 2020-08-27.
  61. ^ a b Gell, Y.; Lichtenberg, D.B. (1969). "Quark model and the magnetic moments of proton and neutron". Il Nuovo Cimento A. Series 10. 61 (1): 27–40. Bibcode:1969NCimA..61...27G. doi:10.1007/BF02760010. S2CID 123822660.
  62. ^ a b c Perkins, Donald H. (1982). Introduction to High Energy Physics. Addison Wesley, Reading, Massachusetts. pp. 201–202. ISBN 978-0-201-05757-7.
  63. ^ Greenberg, O.W. (2009), "Color Charge Degree of Freedom in Particle Physics", Compendium of Quantum Physics, Springer Berlin Heidelberg, pp. 109–111, arXiv:0805.0289, doi:10.1007/978-3-540-70626-7_32, ISBN 978-3-540-70622-9, S2CID 17512393
  64. ^ Beg, M.A.B.; Lee, B.W.; Pais, A. (1964). "SU(6) and electromagnetic interactions". Physical Review Letters. 13 (16): 514–517, erratum 650. Bibcode:1964PhRvL..13..514B. doi:10.1103/physrevlett.13.514.
  65. ^ Sakita, B. (1964). "Electromagnetic properties of baryons in the supermultiplet scheme of elementary particles". Physical Review Letters. 13 (21): 643–646. Bibcode:1964PhRvL..13..643S. doi:10.1103/physrevlett.13.643.
  66. ^ a b Cho, Adrian (2 April 2010). "Mass of the Common Quark Finally Nailed Down". Science. American Association for the Advancement of Science. from the original on 27 August 2015. Retrieved 27 September 2014.
  67. ^ Wilczek, F. (2003). "The Origin of Mass" (PDF). MIT Physics Annual: 24–35. (PDF) from the original on June 20, 2015.
  68. ^ Ji, Xiangdong (1995). "A QCD Analysis of the Mass Structure of the Nucleon". Physical Review Letters. 74 (7): 1071–1074. arXiv:hep-ph/9410274. Bibcode:1995PhRvL..74.1071J. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.74.1071. PMID 10058927. S2CID 15148740.
  69. ^ Martinelli, G.; Parisi, G.; Petronzio, R.; Rapuano, F. (1982). "The proton and neutron magnetic moments in lattice QCD" (PDF). Physics Letters B. 116 (6): 434–436. Bibcode:1982PhLB..116..434M. doi:10.1016/0370-2693(82)90162-9. (PDF) from the original on 2020-04-20. Retrieved 2019-08-25.
  70. ^ Kincade, Kathy (2 February 2015). "Pinpointing the magnetic moments of nuclear matter". Phys.org. from the original on 2 May 2015. Retrieved May 8, 2015.
  71. ^ Miller, G.A. (2007). "Charge Densities of the Neutron and Proton". Physical Review Letters. 99 (11): 112001. arXiv:0705.2409. Bibcode:2007PhRvL..99k2001M. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.99.112001. PMID 17930428. S2CID 119120565.
  72. ^ "Pear-shaped particles probe big-bang mystery" (Press release). University of Sussex. 20 February 2006. from the original on 2011-06-07. Retrieved 2009-12-14.
  73. ^ A cryogenic experiment to search for the EDM of the neutron 2012-02-16 at the Wayback Machine. Hepwww.rl.ac.uk. Retrieved on 2012-08-16.
  74. ^ Search for the neutron electric dipole moment: nEDM 2015-09-25 at the Wayback Machine. Nedm.web.psi.ch (2001-09-12). Retrieved on 2012-08-16.
  75. ^ US nEDM ORNL experiment public page 2017-04-30 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved on 2017-02-08.
  76. ^ SNS Neutron EDM Experiment 2011-02-10 at the Wayback Machine. P25ext.lanl.gov. Retrieved on 2012-08-16.
  77. ^ Measurement of the Neutron Electric Dipole Moment 2011-08-23 at the Wayback Machine. Nrd.pnpi.spb.ru. Retrieved on 2012-08-16.
  78. ^ Thoennessen, Michael (2016). Unbound Isotopes. Cham: Springer International Publishing. pp. 275–291. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-31763-2_16. ISBN 978-3-319-31761-8.
  79. ^ Spyrou, A.; et al. (2012). "First Observation of Ground State Dineutron Decay: 16Be". Physical Review Letters. 108 (10): 102501. Bibcode:2012PhRvL.108j2501S. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.102501. PMID 22463404.
  80. ^ Marqués, F. M.; Labiche, M.; Orr, N. A.; Angélique, J. C.; Axelsson, L.; Benoit, B.; Bergmann, U. C.; Borge, M. J. G.; Catford, W. N.; Chappell, S. P. G.; Clarke, N. M.; Costa, G.; Curtis, N.; D’Arrigo, A.; de Góes Brennand, E. (2002-04-01). "Detection of neutron clusters". Physical Review C. 65 (4). arXiv:nucl-ex/0111001. doi:10.1103/PhysRevC.65.044006. ISSN 0556-2813.
  81. ^ Kisamori, K.; et al. (2016). "Candidate Resonant Tetraneutron State Populated by the He4(He8,Be8) Reaction". Physical Review Letters. 116 (5): 052501. Bibcode:2016PhRvL.116e2501K. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.052501. PMID 26894705.
  82. ^ Duer, M.; Aumann, T.; Gernhäuser, R.; Panin, V.; Paschalis, S.; Rossi, D. M.; Achouri, N. L.; Ahn, D.; Baba, H.; Bertulani, C. A.; Böhmer, M.; Boretzky, K.; Caesar, C.; Chiga, N.; Corsi, A. (2022-06-23). "Observation of a correlated free four-neutron system". Nature. 606 (7915): 678–682. doi:10.1038/s41586-022-04827-6. ISSN 0028-0836. PMC 9217746. PMID 35732764.
  83. ^ "Physicists find signs of four-neutron nucleus". 2016-02-24. from the original on 2017-07-29. Retrieved 2017-06-27.
  84. ^ Orr, Nigel (2016-02-03). "Can Four Neutrons Tango?". Physics. 9: 14. Bibcode:2016PhyOJ...9...14O. doi:10.1103/Physics.9.14.
  85. ^ Gandolfi, Stefano; Gezerlis, Alexandros; Carlson, J. (2015-10-19). "Neutron Matter from Low to High Density". Annual Review of Nuclear and Particle Science. 65 (1): 303–328. arXiv:1501.05675. doi:10.1146/annurev-nucl-102014-021957. ISSN 0163-8998.
  86. ^ Llanes-Estrada, Felipe J.; Moreno Navarro, Gaspar (2012). "Cubic neutrons". Modern Physics Letters A. 27 (6): 1250033–1–1250033–7. arXiv:1108.1859. Bibcode:2012MPLA...2750033L. doi:10.1142/S0217732312500332. S2CID 118407306.
  87. ^ Knoll, Glenn F. (1979). "Ch. 14". Radiation Detection and Measurement. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-0471495451.
  88. ^ Ghosh, P.; W. Fu; M. J. Harrison; P. K. Doyle; N. S. Edwards; J. A. Roberts; D. S. McGregor (2018). "A high-efficiency, low-Ĉerenkov Micro-Layered Fast-Neutron Detector for the TREAT hodoscope". Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A. 904: 100–106. Bibcode:2018NIMPA.904..100G. doi:10.1016/j.nima.2018.07.035. S2CID 126130994. from the original on 2022-04-12. Retrieved 2020-04-14.
  89. ^ Ghosh, P.; D. M. Nichols; W. Fu; J. A. Roberts; D. S. McGregor (2019). "Gamma-Ray Rejection of the SiPM-coupled Micro-Layered Fast-Neutron Detector". 2019 IEEE Nuclear Science Symposium and Medical Imaging Conference (NSS/MIC). pp. 1–3. doi:10.1109/NSS/MIC42101.2019.9059869. ISBN 978-1-7281-4164-0. S2CID 204877955.
  90. ^ a b Carson, M.J.; et al. (2004). "Neutron background in large-scale xenon detectors for dark matter searches". Astroparticle Physics. 21 (6): 667–687. arXiv:hep-ex/0404042. Bibcode:2004APh....21..667C. doi:10.1016/j.astropartphys.2004.05.001. S2CID 17887096.
  91. ^ Köhn, C.; Ebert, U. (2015). "Calculation of beams of positrons, neutrons and protons associated with terrestrial gamma-ray flashes" (PDF). Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres. 23 (4): 1620–1635. Bibcode:2015JGRD..120.1620K. doi:10.1002/2014JD022229. (PDF) from the original on 2019-12-23. Retrieved 2019-08-25.
  92. ^ Köhn, C.; Diniz, G.; Harakeh, Muhsin (2017). "Production mechanisms of leptons, photons, and hadrons and their possible feedback close to lightning leaders". Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres. 122 (2): 1365–1383. Bibcode:2017JGRD..122.1365K. doi:10.1002/2016JD025445. PMC 5349290. PMID 28357174.
  93. ^ Clowdsley, MS; Wilson, JW; Kim, MH; Singleterry, RC; Tripathi, RK; Heinbockel, JH; Badavi, FF; Shinn, JL (2001). (PDF). Physica Medica. 17 (Suppl 1): 94–96. PMID 11770546. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2005-02-25.
  94. ^ Byrne, J. Neutrons, Nuclei, and Matter, Dover Publications, Mineola, New York, 2011, ISBN 0486482383, pp. 32–33.
  95. ^ . Archived from the original on 2020-02-14. Retrieved 2020-04-16.
  96. ^ Science/Nature |Q&A: Nuclear fusion reactor 2022-02-25 at the Wayback Machine. BBC News (2006-02-06). Retrieved on 2010-12-04.
  97. ^ Byrne, J. Neutrons, Nuclei, and Matter, Dover Publications, Mineola, New York, 2011, ISBN 0486482383, p. 453.
  98. ^ Klein, A G; Werner, S A (1983-03-01). "Neutron optics". Reports on Progress in Physics. IOP Publishing. 46 (3): 259–335. doi:10.1088/0034-4885/46/3/001. ISSN 0034-4885. S2CID 250903152.
  99. ^ Kumakhov, M.A.; Sharov, V.A. (1992). "A neutron lens". Nature. 357 (6377): 390–391. Bibcode:1992Natur.357..390K. doi:10.1038/357390a0. S2CID 37062511.
  100. ^ Physorg.com, "New Way of 'Seeing': A 'Neutron Microscope'" 2012-01-24 at the Wayback Machine. Physorg.com (2004-07-30). Retrieved on 2012-08-16.
  101. ^ "NASA Develops a Nugget to Search for Life in Space" 2014-03-08 at the Wayback Machine. NASA.gov (2007-11-30). Retrieved on 2012-08-16.
  102. ^ Ioffe, A.; Dabagov, S.; Kumakhov, M. (1995-01-01). "Effective neutron bending at large angles". Neutron News. 6 (3): 20–21. doi:10.1080/10448639508217696. ISSN 1044-8632.
  103. ^ Hall, Eric J. (2000). Radiobiology for the radiologist (5th ed.). Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. ISBN 0-7817-2649-2. OCLC 43854159.
  104. ^ Johns HE and Cunningham JR (1978). The Physics of Radiology. Charles C Thomas 3rd edition
  105. ^ brian.maranville@nist.gov (2017-04-17). "How neutrons are useful". NIST. from the original on 2021-01-25. Retrieved 2021-01-21.
  106. ^ E Hadden; Y Iso; A Kume; K Umemoto; T Jenke; M Fally; J Klepp; Y Tomita (2022). "Highly efficient holographic optical elements for cold neutron experiments". ResearchGate. doi:10.13140/RG.2.2.26033.04963.
  107. ^ Hadden, Elhoucine; Iso, Yuko; Kume, Atsushi; Umemoto, Koichi; Jenke, Tobias; Fally, Martin; Klepp, Jürgen; Tomita, Yasuo (2022-05-24). "Nanodiamond-based nanoparticle-polymer composite gratings with extremely large neutron refractive index modulation". In McLeod, Robert R; Tomita, Yasuo; Sheridan, John T; Pascual Villalobos, Inmaculada (eds.). Photosensitive Materials and their Applications II. Vol. 12151. SPIE. pp. 70–76. Bibcode:2022SPIE12151E..09H. doi:10.1117/12.2623661. ISBN 9781510651784. S2CID 249056691.
  108. ^ B. Lauss (May 2012). "Startup of the high-intensity ultracold neutron source at the Paul Scherrer Institute". Hyperfine Interact. 211 (1): 21–25. arXiv:1202.6003. Bibcode:2012HyInt.211...21L. doi:10.1007/s10751-012-0578-7. S2CID 119164071.
  109. ^ R. Golub & J. M. Pendlebury (1977). "The interaction of Ultra-Cold Neutrons (UCN) with liquid helium and a superthermal UCN source". Phys. Lett. A. 62 (5): 337–339. Bibcode:1977PhLA...62..337G. doi:10.1016/0375-9601(77)90434-0.
  110. ^ A. Steyerl; H. Nagel; F.-X. Schreiber; K.-A. Steinhauser; R. Gähler; W. Gläser; P. Ageron; J. M. Astruc; W. Drexel; G. Gervais & W. Mampe (1986). "A new source of cold and ultracold neutrons". Phys. Lett. A. 116 (7): 347–352. Bibcode:1986PhLA..116..347S. doi:10.1016/0375-9601(86)90587-6.
  111. ^ Stefan Döge; Jürgen Hingerl & Christoph Morkel (Feb 2020). "Measured velocity spectra and neutron densities of the PF2 ultracold-neutron beam ports at the Institut Laue–Langevin". Nucl. Instrum. Methods A. 953: 163112. arXiv:2001.04538. Bibcode:2020NIMPA.95363112D. doi:10.1016/j.nima.2019.163112. S2CID 209942845. from the original on 2021-02-24. Retrieved 2020-04-24.
  112. ^ Freeman, Tami (May 23, 2008). . Medical Physics Web. Archived from the original on 2010-12-20. Retrieved 2011-02-08.
  113. ^ Heilbronn, L.; Nakamura, T; Iwata, Y; Kurosawa, T; Iwase, H; Townsend, LW (2005). "Expand+Overview of secondary neutron production relevant to shielding in space". Radiation Protection Dosimetry. 116 (1–4): 140–143. doi:10.1093/rpd/nci033. PMID 16604615. from the original on 2019-01-26. Retrieved 2019-01-25.

Further reading edit

  • James Byrne, Neutrons, Nuclei and Matter: An Exploration of the Physics of Slow Neutrons. Mineola, New York: Dover Publications, 2011. ISBN 0486482383.
  • Abraham Pais, Inward Bound, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986. ISBN 0198519974.
  • Sin-Itiro Tomonaga, The Story of Spin, The University of Chicago Press, 1997
  • Herwig Schopper, Weak interactions and nuclear beta decay, Publisher, North-Holland Pub. Co., 1966.
  • Annotated bibliography for neutrons from the Alsos Digital Library for Nuclear Issues

February 15, 2024
neutron, this, article, about, subatomic, particle, other, uses, disambiguation, confused, with, neuron, neutrino, neutron, subatomic, particle, symbol, which, neutral, positive, negative, charge, mass, slightly, greater, than, that, proton, protons, neutrons,. This article is about the subatomic particle For other uses see Neutron disambiguation Not to be confused with Neuron or Neutrino The neutron is a subatomic particle symbol n or n0 which has a neutral not positive or negative charge and a mass slightly greater than that of a proton Protons and neutrons constitute the nuclei of atoms Since protons and neutrons behave similarly within the nucleus they are both referred to as nucleons Nucleons have a mass of approximately one atomic mass unit or dalton symbol Da Their properties and interactions are described by nuclear physics Protons and neutrons are not elementary particles each is composed of three quarks NeutronThe quark content of the neutron The color assignment of individual quarks is arbitrary but all three colors must be present Forces between quarks are mediated by gluons ClassificationBaryonComposition1 up quark 2 down quarksStatisticsFermionicFamilyHadronInteractionsGravity weak strong electromagneticSymboln n0 N0AntiparticleAntineutronTheorizedErnest Rutherford 1 1920 DiscoveredJames Chadwick 2 1932 Mass1 674927 498 04 95 10 27 kg 3 939 565420 52 54 MeV c2 3 1 008664 915 88 49 Da 4 Mean lifetime879 4 6 s free 5 Electric charge0 e 2 8 10 22 e experimental limits 6 Electric dipole moment lt 1 8 10 26 e cm experimental upper limit Electric polarizability1 16 15 10 3 fm3Magnetic moment 0 966236 50 23 10 26 J T 1 4 1 041875 63 25 10 3 mB 4 1 913042 73 45 mN 4 Magnetic polarizability3 7 20 10 4 fm3Spin1 2 ħIsospin 1 2Parity 1CondensedI JP 1 2 1 2 The chemical properties of an atom are mostly determined by the configuration of electrons that orbit the atom s heavy nucleus The electron configuration is determined by the charge of the nucleus which is determined by the number of protons or atomic number The number of neutrons is the neutron number Neutrons do not affect the electron configuration Atoms of a chemical element that differ only in neutron number are called isotopes For example carbon with atomic number 6 has an abundant isotope carbon 12 with 6 neutrons and a rare isotope carbon 13 with 7 neutrons Some elements occur in nature with only one stable isotope such as fluorine Other elements occur with many stable isotopes such as tin with ten stable isotopes or with no stable isotope such as technetium The properties of an atomic nucleus depend on both atomic and neutron numbers With their positive charge the protons within the nucleus are repelled by the long range electromagnetic force but the much stronger but short range nuclear force binds the nucleons closely together Neutrons are required for the stability of nuclei with the exception of the single proton hydrogen nucleus Neutrons are produced copiously in nuclear fission and fusion They are a primary contributor to the nucleosynthesis of chemical elements within stars through fission fusion and neutron capture processes The neutron is essential to the production of nuclear power In the decade after the neutron was discovered by James Chadwick in 1932 neutrons were used to induce many different types of nuclear transmutations With the discovery of nuclear fission in 1938 it was quickly realized that if a fission event produced neutrons each of these neutrons might cause further fission events in a cascade known as a nuclear chain reaction These events and findings led to the first self sustaining nuclear reactor Chicago Pile 1 1942 and the first nuclear weapon Trinity 1945 Dedicated neutron sources like neutron generators research reactors and spallation sources produce free neutrons for use in irradiation and in neutron scattering experiments A free neutron spontaneously decays to a proton an electron and an antineutrino with a mean lifetime of about 15 minutes Free neutrons do not directly ionize atoms but they do indirectly cause ionizing radiation so they can be a biological hazard depending on dose A small natural neutron background flux of free neutrons exists on Earth caused by cosmic ray showers and by the natural radioactivity of spontaneously fissionable elements in the Earth s crust Contents 1 Neutrons in an atomic nucleus 1 1 Beta decay 2 The free neutron 3 Neutrons and protons bound in a nucleus 3 1 Competition of beta decay types 4 The neutron in elementary particle physics the Standard Model 5 Discovery 6 Intrinsic properties 6 1 Mass 6 2 Spin 6 3 Magnetic moment 6 4 Electric charge 6 5 Structure and geometry of charge distribution 6 6 Electric dipole moment 6 7 Antineutron 7 Neutron compounds 7 1 Dineutrons and tetraneutrons 7 2 Neutron stars and neutron matter 8 Detection 8 1 Neutron detection by neutron capture 8 2 Neutron detection by elastic scattering 9 Sources and production 9 1 Neutron beams and modification of beams after production 10 Applications 11 Medical therapies 12 Protection 13 Neutron temperature 13 1 Thermal neutrons 13 2 Cold neutrons 13 3 Ultracold neutrons 13 4 Fission energy neutrons 13 5 Fusion neutrons 13 6 Intermediate energy neutrons 13 7 High energy neutrons 14 See also 14 1 Neutron sources 14 2 Processes involving neutrons 15 References 16 Further readingNeutrons in an atomic nucleus editAn atomic nucleus is formed by a number of protons Z the atomic number and a number of neutrons N the neutron number bound together by the nuclear force Protons and neutrons each have a mass of approximately one dalton The atomic number determines the chemical properties of the atom and the neutron number determines the isotope or nuclide 7 The terms isotope and nuclide are often used synonymously but they refer to chemical and nuclear properties respectively Isotopes are nuclides with the same atomic number but different neutron number Nuclides with the same neutron number but different atomic number are called isotones The atomic mass number A is equal to the sum of atomic and neutron numbers Nuclides with the same atomic mass number but different atomic and neutron numbers are called isobars The mass of a nucleus is always slightly less than the sum of its proton and neutron masses the difference in mass represents the mass equivalent to nuclear binding energy the energy which would need to be added to take the nucleus apart 8 822 The nucleus of the most common isotope of the hydrogen atom with the chemical symbol 1H is a lone proton The nuclei of the heavy hydrogen isotopes deuterium D or 2H and tritium T or 3H contain one proton bound to one and two neutrons respectively All other types of atomic nuclei are composed of two or more protons and various numbers of neutrons The most common nuclide of the common chemical element lead 208Pb has 82 protons and 126 neutrons for example The table of nuclides comprises all the known nuclides Even though it is not a chemical element the neutron is included in this table 9 nbsp Nuclear fission caused by absorption of a neutron by uranium 235 The heavy nuclide fragments into lighter components and additional neutrons Protons and neutrons behave almost identically under the influence of the nuclear force within the nucleus They are therefore both referred to collectively as nucleons 10 The concept of isospin in which the proton and neutron are viewed as two quantum states of the same particle is used to model the interactions of nucleons by the nuclear or weak forces Because of the strength of the nuclear force at short distances the nuclear energy binding nucleons is more than seven orders of magnitude larger than the electromagnetic energy binding electrons in atoms Nuclear reactions such as nuclear fission therefore have an energy density that is more than ten million times that of chemical reactions Ultimately the ability of the nuclear force to store energy arising from the electromagnetic repulsion of nuclear components is the basis for most of the energy that makes nuclear reactors or bombs possible In nuclear fission the absorption of a neutron by a heavy nuclide e g uranium 235 causes the nuclide to become unstable and break into light nuclides and additional neutrons The positively charged light nuclides then repel releasing electromagnetic potential energy Beta decay edit Main article Beta decay Neutrons and protons within a nucleus behave similarly and can exchange their identities by similar reactions These reactions are a form of radioactive decay known as beta decay Beta decay in which neutrons decay to protons or vice versa is governed by the weak force and it requires the emission or absorption of electrons and neutrinos or their antiparticles The neutron and proton decay reactions are n0 p e n ewhere p e and n e denote the proton electron and electron anti neutrino decay products 11 and p n0 e newhere n0 e and ne denote the neutron positron and electron neutrino decay products The electron and positron produced in these reactions are historically known as beta particles denoted b or b respectively lending the name to the decay process In these reactions the original particle is not composed of the product particles rather the product particles are created at the instant of the reaction The free neutron editMain article Free neutron decay Free neutrons or protons are nucleons that exist independently free of any nucleus The free neutron has a mass of 939565 413 3 eV c2 or 1 674927 471 10 27 kg or 1 008664 915 88 Da 4 The neutron has a mean square radius of about 0 8 10 15 m or 0 8 fm 12 and it is a spin fermion 13 The neutron has no measurable electric charge With its positive electric charge the proton is directly influenced by electric fields whereas the neutron is unaffected by electric fields But the neutron has a magnetic moment so the neutron is influenced by magnetic fields The specific properties of the neutron are described below in the Intrinsic properties section Outside the nucleus free neutrons are unstable and have a mean lifetime of 879 6 0 8 s about 14 minutes 40 seconds by beta decay therefore the half life for this process which differs from the mean lifetime by a factor of ln 2 0 693 is 610 1 0 7 s about 10 minutes 10 seconds 14 15 This decay which produces a proton an electron and electron anti neutrino is possible because the mass of the neutron is slightly greater than that of the proton By the mass energy equivalence when a neutron decays to a proton this way a lower energy state is attained For the free neutron the decay energy for this process based on the masses of the neutron proton and electron is 0 782343 MeV By comparison the mass energy of the neutron is 939 6 MeV The maximal energy of the beta decay electron in the process wherein the neutrino receives a vanishingly small amount of kinetic energy has been measured at 0 782 0 013 MeV 16 The latter number is not well enough measured to determine the comparatively tiny rest mass of the neutrino which must in theory be subtracted from the maximal electron kinetic energy The neutrino mass is better constrained by many other methods The decay of a free proton to a more massive neutron is energetically disallowed A high energy collision of a proton and an electron or neutrino can result in a neutron however A small fraction about one in 1000 of free neutrons decay with the same products but add an extra particle in the form of an emitted gamma ray n0 p e n e gThis gamma ray may be thought of as an internal bremsstrahlung that arises from the electromagnetic interaction of the emitted beta particle with the proton Internal bremsstrahlung gamma ray production is also a minor feature of beta decays of bound neutrons as discussed below nbsp A schematic of the nucleus of an atom indicating b radiation the emission of a fast electron from the nucleus the accompanying antineutrino is omitted In the Rutherford model for the nucleus red spheres were protons with positive charge and blue spheres were protons tightly bound to an electron with no net charge The inset shows beta decay of a free neutron as it is understood today an electron and antineutrino are created in this process A very small minority of neutron decays about four per million are so called two body neutron decays in which a proton electron and antineutrino are produced as usual but the electron fails to gain the 13 6 eV necessary energy to escape the proton the ionization energy of hydrogen and therefore simply remains bound to it forming a neutral hydrogen atom one of the two bodies In this type of free neutron decay almost all of the neutron decay energy is carried off by the antineutrino the other body The hydrogen atom recoils with a speed of only about decay energy hydrogen rest energy times the speed of light or 250 km s Neutrons and protons bound in a nucleus editMain articles Atomic nucleus and Nuclear physics See also Valley of stability Beta decay stable isobars and Neutron emission Neutrons are a necessary constituent of any atomic nucleus that contains more than one proton As a result of their positive charges interacting protons have a mutual electromagnetic repulsion that is stronger than their attractive nuclear interaction so proton only nuclei are unstable see diproton and neutron proton ratio 17 Neutrons bind with protons and one another in the nucleus via the nuclear force effectively moderating the repulsive forces between the protons and stabilizing the nucleus While a free neutron has a half life of about 10 2 min and a free proton is stable within nuclei neutrons are often stable and protons are sometimes unstable When bound within a nucleus nucleons can decay by the beta decay process The neutrons and protons in a nucleus form a quantum mechanical system according to the nuclear shell model Protons and neutrons of a nuclide are organized into discrete hierarchical energy levels with unique quantum numbers Nucleon decay within a nucleus can occur if allowed by basic energy conservation and quantum mechanical constraints The decay products that is the emitted particles carry away the energy excess as a nucleon falls from one quantum state to one with less energy while the neutron or proton changes to a proton or neutron For a neutron to decay the resulting proton requires an available state at lower energy than the initial neutron state In stable nuclei the possible lower energy states are all filled meaning each state is occupied by a pair of protons one with spin up another with spin down When all available proton states are filled the Pauli exclusion principle disallows the decay of a neutron to a proton within stable nuclei The situation is similar to electrons of an atom where electrons that occupy distinct atomic orbitals are prevented by the exclusion principle from decaying to lower already filled energy states with the emission of a photon The stability of nuclei and nuclide radioactivity are consequences of these constraints One example of the decay of a neutron within a nuclide is the carbon isotope carbon 14 which has 6 protons and 8 neutrons With its excess of neutrons this isotope decays by beta decay to nitrogen 14 7 protons 7 neutrons with a half life of about 5 730 years The decay emits an electron and an electron anti neutrino Nitrogen 14 is stable since none of its protons or neutrons have available quantum states of lesser energy The transformation of a proton to a neutron inside of a nucleus is also possible through electron capture p e n0 nePositron capture by neutrons in nuclei that contain an excess of neutrons is also possible but is hindered because positrons are both relatively rare in ordinary matter and quickly annihilate when they encounter electrons which are much less rare and in any case are repelled by the positive nucleus Similar but far more rare reactions involve the capture of a neutrino by a nucleon in inverse beta decay Competition of beta decay types edit Three types of beta decay in competition are illustrated by the single isotope copper 64 29 protons 35 neutrons which has a half life of about 12 7 hours This isotope has one unpaired proton and one unpaired neutron so either the proton or the neutron can decay This particular nuclide is almost equally likely to undergo proton decay by positron emission 18 or by electron capture 43 both forming 64 Ni or neutron decay by electron emission 39 forming 64 Zn The neutron in elementary particle physics the Standard Model edit nbsp The principal Feynman diagram for b decay of a neutron into a proton electron and electron antineutrino via an intermediate heavy W boson nbsp The principal Feynman diagram for b decay of a proton into a neutron positron and electron neutrino via an intermediate heavy W boson Main article Standard Model Within the theoretical framework of Standard Model for particle physics a neutron comprises two down quarks with charge 1 3 e and one up quark with charge 2 3 e The neutron is therefore a composite particle classified as a hadron The neutron is also classified as a baryon because it is composed of three valence quarks 18 The finite size of the neutron and its magnetic moment both indicate that the neutron is a composite rather than elementary particle The quarks of the neutron are held together by the strong force mediated by gluons 19 The nuclear force results from secondary effects of the more fundamental strong force The only possible decay mode for the neutron that conserves baryon number is for one of the neutron s quarks to change flavour via the weak interaction The decay of one of the neutron s down quarks into a lighter up quark can be achieved by the emission of a W boson By this process the Standard Model description of beta decay the neutron decays into a proton which contains one down and two up quarks an electron and an electron antineutrino The decay of the proton to a neutron occurs similarly through the weak force The decay of one of the proton s up quarks into a down quark can be achieved by the emission of a W boson The proton decays into a neutron a positron and an electron neutrino This reaction can only occur within an atomic nucleus which has a quantum state at lower energy available for the created neutron Discovery editMain article Discovery of the neutron The story of the discovery of the neutron and its properties is central to the extraordinary developments in atomic physics that occurred in the first half of the 20th century leading ultimately to the atomic bomb in 1945 In the 1911 Rutherford model the atom consisted of a small positively charged massive nucleus surrounded by a much larger cloud of negatively charged electrons In 1920 Ernest Rutherford suggested that the nucleus consisted of positive protons and neutrally charged particles suggested to be a proton and an electron bound in some way 20 Electrons were assumed to reside within the nucleus because it was known that beta radiation consisted of electrons emitted from the nucleus 20 About the time Rutherford suggested the neutral proton electron composite several other publications appeared making similar suggestions and in 1921 the American chemist W D Harkins first named the hypothetical particle a neutron 21 22 The name derives from the Latin root for neutralis neuter and the Greek suffix on a suffix used in the names of subatomic particles i e electron and proton 23 24 References to the word neutron in connection with the atom can be found in the literature as early as 1899 however 22 Throughout the 1920s physicists assumed that the atomic nucleus was composed of protons and nuclear electrons 25 26 but this raised obvious problems It was difficult to reconcile the proton electron model of the nucleus with the Heisenberg uncertainty relation of quantum mechanics 27 28 The Klein paradox 29 discovered by Oskar Klein in 1928 presented further quantum mechanical objections to the notion of an electron confined within a nucleus 27 Observed properties of atoms and molecules were inconsistent with the nuclear spin expected from the proton electron hypothesis Both protons and electrons carry an intrinsic spin of 1 2 ħ Isotopes of the same species i e having the same number of protons can have both integer or fractional spin i e the neutron spin must be also fractional 1 2 ħ But there is no way to arrange the spins of an electron and a proton supposed to bond to form a neutron to get the fractional spin of a neutron In 1931 Walther Bothe and Herbert Becker found that if alpha particle radiation from polonium fell on beryllium boron or lithium an unusually penetrating radiation was produced The radiation was not influenced by an electric field so Bothe and Becker assumed it was gamma radiation 30 31 The following year Irene Joliot Curie and Frederic Joliot Curie in Paris showed that if this gamma radiation fell on paraffin or any other hydrogen containing compound it ejected protons of very high energy 32 Neither Rutherford nor James Chadwick at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge were convinced by the gamma ray interpretation 33 Chadwick quickly performed a series of experiments that showed that the new radiation consisted of uncharged particles with about the same mass as the proton 34 35 36 These properties matched Rutherford s hypothesized neutron Chadwick won the 1935 Nobel Prize in Physics for this discovery 2 nbsp Models depicting the nucleus and electron energy levels in hydrogen helium lithium and neon atoms In reality the diameter of the nucleus is about 100 000 times smaller than the diameter of the atom Models for an atomic nucleus consisting of protons and neutrons were quickly developed by Werner Heisenberg 37 38 39 and others 40 41 The proton neutron model explained the puzzle of nuclear spins The origins of beta radiation were explained by Enrico Fermi in 1934 by the process of beta decay in which the neutron decays to a proton by creating an electron and a at the time undiscovered neutrino 42 In 1935 Chadwick and his doctoral student Maurice Goldhaber reported the first accurate measurement of the mass of the neutron 43 44 By 1934 Fermi had bombarded heavier elements with neutrons to induce radioactivity in elements of high atomic number In 1938 Fermi received the Nobel Prize in Physics for his demonstrations of the existence of new radioactive elements produced by neutron irradiation and for his related discovery of nuclear reactions brought about by slow neutrons 45 In December 1938 Otto Hahn Lise Meitner and Fritz Strassmann discovered nuclear fission or the fractionation of uranium nuclei into lighter elements induced by neutron bombardment 46 47 48 49 In 1945 Hahn received the 1944 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his discovery of the fission of heavy atomic nuclei 50 51 52 The discovery of nuclear fission would lead to the development of nuclear power and the atomic bomb by the end of World War II It was quickly realized that if a fission event produced neutrons each of these neutrons might cause further fission events in a cascade known as a nuclear chain reaction 7 These events and findings led Fermi to construct the Chicago Pile 1 at the University of Chicago in 1942 the first self sustaining nuclear reactor Just three years later the Manhattan Project was able to test the first atomic bomb the Trinity nuclear test in July 1945 Intrinsic properties editMass edit The mass of a neutron cannot be directly determined by mass spectrometry since it has no electric charge But since the masses of a proton and of a deuteron can be measured with a mass spectrometer the mass of a neutron can be deduced by subtracting proton mass from deuteron mass with the difference being the mass of the neutron plus the binding energy of deuterium expressed as a positive emitted energy The latter can be directly measured by measuring the energy B d displaystyle B d nbsp of the single 2 224 MeV gamma photon emitted when a deuteron is formed by a proton capturing a neutron this is exothermic and happens with zero energy neutrons The small recoil kinetic energy E r d displaystyle E rd nbsp of the deuteron about 0 06 of the total energy must also be accounted for m n m d m p B d E r d displaystyle m n m d m p B d E rd nbsp The energy of the gamma ray can be measured to high precision by X ray diffraction techniques as was first done by Bell and Elliot in 1948 The best modern 1986 values for neutron mass by this technique are provided by Greene et al 53 These give a neutron mass of mneutron 1 008644 904 14 DaThe value for the neutron mass in MeV is less accurately known due to less accuracy in the known conversion of Da to MeV c2 54 mneutron 939 56563 28 MeV c2 Another method to determine the mass of a neutron starts from the beta decay of the neutron when the momenta of the resulting proton and electron are measured Spin edit The neutron is a spin 1 2 particle that is it is a fermion with intrinsic angular momentum equal to 1 2 ħ where ħ is the reduced Planck constant For many years after the discovery of the neutron its exact spin was ambiguous Although it was assumed to be a spin 1 2 Dirac particle the possibility that the neutron was a spin 3 2 particle lingered The interactions of the neutron s magnetic moment with an external magnetic field were exploited to finally determine the spin of the neutron 55 In 1949 Hughes and Burgy measured neutrons reflected from a ferromagnetic mirror and found that the angular distribution of the reflections was consistent with spin 1 2 56 In 1954 Sherwood Stephenson and Bernstein employed neutrons in a Stern Gerlach experiment that used a magnetic field to separate the neutron spin states They recorded two such spin states consistent with a spin 1 2 particle 55 57 As a fermion the neutron is subject to the Pauli exclusion principle two neutrons cannot have the same quantum numbers This is the source of the degeneracy pressure which counteracts gravity in neutron stars and prevents them from forming black holes 58 See also Delta baryon Magnetic moment edit Main article Nucleon magnetic moment Even though the neutron is a neutral particle the magnetic moment of a neutron is not zero The neutron is not affected by electric fields but it is affected by magnetic fields The value for the neutron s magnetic moment was first directly measured by Luis Alvarez and Felix Bloch at Berkeley California in 1940 59 Alvarez and Bloch determined the magnetic moment of the neutron to be mn 1 93 2 mN where mN is the nuclear magneton The neutron s magnetic moment has a negative value because its orientation is opposite to the neutron s spin 60 The magnetic moment of the neutron is an indication of its quark substructure and internal charge distribution 61 In the quark model for hadrons the neutron is composed of one up quark charge 2 3 e and two down quarks charge 1 3 e 61 The magnetic moment of the neutron can be modeled as a sum of the magnetic moments of the constituent quarks 62 The calculation assumes that the quarks behave like pointlike Dirac particles each having their own magnetic moment Simplistically the magnetic moment of the neutron can be viewed as resulting from the vector sum of the three quark magnetic moments plus the orbital magnetic moments caused by the movement of the three charged quarks within the neutron In one of the early successes of the Standard Model in 1964 Mirza A B Beg Benjamin W Lee and Abraham Pais calculated the ratio of proton to neutron magnetic moments to be 3 2 or a ratio of 1 5 which agrees with the experimental value to within 3 63 64 65 The measured value for this ratio is 1 459898 05 34 4 The above treatment compares neutrons with protons allowing the complex behavior of quarks to be subtracted out between models and merely exploring what the effects would be of differing quark charges or quark type Such calculations are enough to show that the interior of neutrons is very much like that of protons save for the difference in quark composition with a down quark in the neutron replacing an up quark in the proton The neutron magnetic moment can be roughly computed by assuming a simple nonrelativistic quantum mechanical wavefunction for baryons composed of three quarks A straightforward calculation gives fairly accurate estimates for the magnetic moments of neutrons protons and other baryons 62 For a neutron the result of this calculation is that the magnetic moment of the neutron is given by mn 4 3 md 1 3 mu where md and mu are the magnetic moments for the down and up quarks respectively This result combines the intrinsic magnetic moments of the quarks with their orbital magnetic moments and assumes the three quarks are in a particular dominant quantum state Baryon Magnetic momentof quark model Computed m N displaystyle mu mathrm N nbsp Observed m N displaystyle mu mathrm N nbsp p 4 3 mu 1 3 md 2 79 2 793n 4 3 md 1 3 mu 1 86 1 913The results of this calculation are encouraging but the masses of the up or down quarks were assumed to be 1 3 the mass of a nucleon 62 The masses of the quarks are actually only about 1 that of a nucleon 66 The discrepancy stems from the complexity of the Standard Model for nucleons where most of their mass originates in the gluon fields virtual particles and their associated energy that are essential aspects of the strong force 66 67 Furthermore the complex system of quarks and gluons that constitute a neutron requires a relativistic treatment 68 But the nucleon magnetic moment has been successfully computed numerically from first principles including all of the effects mentioned and using more realistic values for the quark masses The calculation gave results that were in fair agreement with measurement but it required significant computing resources 69 70 Electric charge edit The total electric charge of the neutron is 0 e This zero value has been tested experimentally and the present experimental limit for the charge of the neutron is 2 8 10 22 e 6 or 3 13 10 41 C This value is consistent with zero given the experimental uncertainties indicated in parentheses By comparison the charge of the proton is 1 e Structure and geometry of charge distribution edit An article published in 2007 featuring a model independent analysis concluded that the neutron has a negatively charged exterior a positively charged middle and a negative core 71 In a simplified classical view the negative skin of the neutron assists it to be attracted to the protons with which it interacts in the nucleus but the main attraction between neutrons and protons is via the nuclear force which does not involve electric charge The simplified classical view of the neutron s charge distribution also explains the fact that the neutron magnetic dipole points in the opposite direction from its spin angular momentum vector as compared to the proton This gives the neutron in effect a magnetic moment which resembles a negatively charged particle This can be reconciled classically with a neutral neutron composed of a charge distribution in which the negative sub parts of the neutron have a larger average radius of distribution and therefore contribute more to the particle s magnetic dipole moment than do the positive parts that are on average nearer the core Electric dipole moment edit Main article Neutron electric dipole moment The Standard Model of particle physics predicts a tiny separation of positive and negative charge within the neutron leading to a permanent electric dipole moment 72 But the predicted value is well below the current sensitivity of experiments From several unsolved puzzles in particle physics it is clear that the Standard Model is not the final and full description of all particles and their interactions New theories going beyond the Standard Model generally lead to much larger predictions for the electric dipole moment of the neutron Currently there are at least four experiments trying to measure for the first time a finite neutron electric dipole moment including Cryogenic neutron EDM experiment being set up at the Institut Laue Langevin 73 nEDM experiment under construction at the new UCN source at the Paul Scherrer Institute 74 nEDM experiment being envisaged at the Spallation Neutron Source 75 76 nEDM experiment being built at the Institut Laue Langevin 77 Antineutron edit Main article Antineutron The antineutron is the antiparticle of the neutron It was discovered by Bruce Cork in 1956 a year after the antiproton was discovered CPT symmetry puts strong constraints on the relative properties of particles and antiparticles so studying antineutrons provides stringent tests on CPT symmetry The fractional difference in the masses of the neutron and antineutron is 9 6 10 5 Since the difference is only about two standard deviations away from zero this does not give any convincing evidence of CPT violation 14 Neutron compounds editDineutrons and tetraneutrons edit Main articles Dineutron and Tetraneutron The dineutron is considered an unbound isotope with lifetimes around 10 22 seconds The first evidence for this state was reported by Haddock et al in 1965 78 275 In 2012 Artemis Spyrou from Michigan State University and coworkers reported that they observed for the first time direct dineutron emission in the decay of 16Be The dineutron character is evidenced by a small emission angle between the two neutrons The authors measured the two neutron separation energy to be 1 35 10 MeV in good agreement with shell model calculations using standard interactions for this mass region 79 Evidence for unbound clusters of 4 neutrons or tetraneutron as resonances in the disintegration of beryllium 14 nuclei 80 in 8He 8Be interactions 81 and collisions of 4He nuclei give an estimated lifetime around 10 22 seconds 82 These discoveries should deepen our understanding of the nuclear forces 83 84 Neutron stars and neutron matter edit Main articles Neutron matter and Neutron star At extremely high pressures and temperatures nucleons and electrons are believed to collapse into bulk neutronic matter called neutron matter This is presumed to happen in neutron stars 85 The extreme pressure inside a neutron star may deform the neutrons into a cubic symmetry allowing tighter packing of neutrons 86 Detection editMain article Neutron detection The common means of detecting a charged particle by looking for a track of ionization such as in a cloud chamber does not work for neutrons directly Neutrons that elastically scatter off atoms can create an ionization track that is detectable but the experiments are not as simple to carry out other means for detecting neutrons consisting of allowing them to interact with atomic nuclei are more commonly used The commonly used methods to detect neutrons can therefore be categorized according to the nuclear processes relied upon mainly neutron capture or elastic scattering 87 Neutron detection by neutron capture edit A common method for detecting neutrons involves converting the energy released from neutron capture reactions into electrical signals Certain nuclides have a high neutron capture cross section which is the probability of absorbing a neutron Upon neutron capture the compound nucleus emits more easily detectable radiation for example an alpha particle which is then detected The nuclides 3 He 6 Li 10 B 233 U 235 U 237 Np and 239 Pu are useful for this purpose Neutron detection by elastic scattering edit Neutrons can elastically scatter off nuclei causing the struck nucleus to recoil Kinematically a neutron can transfer more energy to a light nucleus such as hydrogen or helium than to a heavier nucleus Detectors relying on elastic scattering are called fast neutron detectors Recoiling nuclei can ionize and excite further atoms through collisions Charge and or scintillation light produced in this way can be collected to produce a detected signal A major challenge in fast neutron detection is discerning such signals from erroneous signals produced by gamma radiation in the same detector Methods such as pulse shape discrimination can be used in distinguishing neutron signals from gamma ray signals although certain inorganic scintillator based detectors have been developed 88 89 to selectively detect neutrons in mixed radiation fields inherently without any additional techniques Fast neutron detectors have the advantage of not requiring a moderator and are therefore capable of measuring the neutron s energy time of arrival and in certain cases direction of incidence Sources and production editMain articles Neutron source Neutron generator and Research reactor Free neutrons are unstable although they have the longest half life of any unstable subatomic particle by several orders of magnitude Their half life is still only about 10 minutes so they can be obtained only from sources that produce them continuously Natural neutron background A small natural background flux of free neutrons exists everywhere on Earth 90 In the atmosphere and deep into the ocean the neutron background is caused by muons produced by cosmic ray interaction with the atmosphere These high energy muons are capable of penetration to considerable depths in water and soil There in striking atomic nuclei among other reactions they induce spallation reactions in which a neutron is liberated from the nucleus Within the Earth s crust a second source is neutrons produced primarily by spontaneous fission of uranium and thorium present in crustal minerals The neutron background is not strong enough to be a biological hazard but it is of importance to very high resolution particle detectors that are looking for very rare events such as hypothesized interactions that might be caused by particles of dark matter 90 Recent research has shown that even thunderstorms can produce neutrons with energies of up to several tens of MeV 91 Recent research has shown that the fluence of these neutrons lies between 10 9 and 10 13 per ms and per m2 depending on the detection altitude The energy of most of these neutrons even with initial energies of 20 MeV decreases down to the keV range within 1 ms 92 Even stronger neutron background radiation is produced at the surface of Mars where the atmosphere is thick enough to generate neutrons from cosmic ray muon production and neutron spallation but not thick enough to provide significant protection from the neutrons produced These neutrons not only produce a Martian surface neutron radiation hazard from direct downward going neutron radiation but may also produce a significant hazard from reflection of neutrons from the Martian surface which will produce reflected neutron radiation penetrating upward into a Martian craft or habitat from the floor 93 Sources of neutrons for research These include certain types of radioactive decay spontaneous fission and neutron emission and from certain nuclear reactions Convenient nuclear reactions include tabletop reactions such as natural alpha and gamma bombardment of certain nuclides often beryllium or deuterium and induced nuclear fission such as occurs in nuclear reactors In addition high energy nuclear reactions such as occur in cosmic radiation showers or accelerator collisions also produce neutrons from disintegration of target nuclei Small tabletop particle accelerators optimized to produce free neutrons in this way are called neutron generators In practice the most commonly used small laboratory sources of neutrons use radioactive decay to power neutron production One noted neutron producing radioisotope californium 252 decays half life 2 65 years by spontaneous fission 3 of the time with production of 3 7 neutrons per fission and is used alone as a neutron source from this process Nuclear reaction sources that involve two materials powered by radioisotopes use an alpha decay source plus a beryllium target or else a source of high energy gamma radiation from a source that undergoes beta decay followed by gamma decay which produces photoneutrons on interaction of the high energy gamma ray with ordinary stable beryllium or else with the deuterium in heavy water A popular source of the latter type is radioactive antimony 124 plus beryllium a system with a half life of 60 9 days which can be constructed from natural antimony which is 42 8 stable antimony 123 by activating it with neutrons in a nuclear reactor then transported to where the neutron source is needed 94 nbsp Institut Laue Langevin ILL in Grenoble France a major neutron research facility Nuclear fission reactors naturally produce free neutrons their role is to sustain the energy producing chain reaction The intense neutron radiation can also be used to produce various radioisotopes through the process of neutron activation which is a type of neutron capture Experimental nuclear fusion reactors produce free neutrons as a waste product But it is these neutrons that possess most of the energy and converting that energy to a useful form has proved a difficult engineering challenge Fusion reactors that generate neutrons are likely to create radioactive waste but the waste is composed of neutron activated lighter isotopes which have relatively short 50 100 years decay periods as compared to typical half lives of 10 000 years 95 for fission waste which is long due primarily to the long half life of alpha emitting transuranic actinides 96 Some nuclear fusion fission hybrids are proposed to make use of those neutrons to either maintain a subcritical reactor or to aid in nuclear transmutation of harmful long lived nuclear waste to shorter lived or stable nuclides Neutron beams and modification of beams after production edit Free neutron beams are obtained from neutron sources by neutron transport For access to intense neutron sources researchers must go to a specialized neutron facility that operates a research reactor or a spallation source The neutron s lack of total electric charge makes it difficult to steer or accelerate them Charged particles can be accelerated decelerated or deflected by electric or magnetic fields These methods have little effect on neutrons But some effects may be attained by use of inhomogeneous magnetic fields because of the neutron s magnetic moment Neutrons can be controlled by methods that include moderation reflection and velocity selection Thermal neutrons can be polarized by transmission through magnetic materials in a method analogous to the Faraday effect for photons Cold neutrons of wavelengths of 6 7 angstroms can be produced in beams of a high degree of polarization by use of magnetic mirrors and magnetized interference filters 97 Applications editThe neutron plays an important role in many nuclear reactions For example neutron capture often results in neutron activation inducing radioactivity In particular knowledge of neutrons and their behavior has been important in the development of nuclear reactors and nuclear weapons The fissioning of elements like uranium 235 and plutonium 239 is caused by their absorption of neutrons Cold thermal and hot neutron radiation is commonly employed in neutron scattering facilities for neutron diffraction small angle neutron scattering and neutron reflectometry Slow neutron matter waves exhibit properties similar to geometrical and wave optics of light including reflection refraction diffraction and interference 98 Neutrons are complementary to X rays in terms of atomic contrasts by different scattering cross sections sensitivity to magnetism energy range for inelastic neutron spectroscopy and deep penetration into matter The development of neutron lenses based on total internal reflection within hollow glass capillary tubes or by reflection from dimpled aluminum plates has driven ongoing research into neutron microscopy and neutron gamma ray tomography 99 100 101 102 A major use of neutrons is to excite delayed and prompt gamma rays from elements in materials This forms the basis of neutron activation analysis NAA and prompt gamma neutron activation analysis PGNAA NAA is most often used to analyze small samples of materials in a nuclear reactor whilst PGNAA is most often used to analyze subterranean rocks around bore holes and industrial bulk materials on conveyor belts Another use of neutron emitters is the detection of light nuclei in particular the hydrogen found in water molecules When a fast neutron collides with a light nucleus it loses a large fraction of its energy By measuring the rate at which slow neutrons return to the probe after reflecting off of hydrogen nuclei a neutron probe may determine the water content in soil Medical therapies editMain articles Fast neutron therapy and Neutron capture therapy of cancer Because neutron radiation is both penetrating and ionizing it can be exploited for medical treatments However neutron radiation can have the unfortunate side effect of leaving the affected area radioactive Neutron tomography is therefore not a viable medical application Fast neutron therapy uses high energy neutrons typically greater than 20 MeV to treat cancer Radiation therapy of cancers is based upon the biological response of cells to ionizing radiation If radiation is delivered in small sessions to damage cancerous areas normal tissue will have time to repair itself while tumor cells often cannot 103 Neutron radiation can deliver energy to a cancerous region at a rate an order of magnitude larger than gamma radiation 104 Beams of low energy neutrons are used in boron neutron capture therapy to treat cancer In boron neutron capture therapy the patient is given a drug that contains boron and that preferentially accumulates in the tumor to be targeted The tumor is then bombarded with very low energy neutrons although often higher than thermal energy which are captured by the boron 10 isotope in the boron which produces an excited state of boron 11 that then decays to produce lithium 7 and an alpha particle that have sufficient energy to kill the malignant cell but insufficient range to damage nearby cells For such a therapy to be applied to the treatment of cancer a neutron source having an intensity of the order of a thousand million 109 neutrons per second per cm2 is preferred Such fluxes require a research nuclear reactor Protection editExposure to free neutrons can be hazardous since the interaction of neutrons with molecules in the body can cause disruption to molecules and atoms and can also cause reactions that give rise to other forms of radiation such as protons 7 The normal precautions of radiation protection apply Avoid exposure stay as far from the source as possible and keep exposure time to a minimum But particular thought must be given to how to protect from neutron exposure For other types of radiation e g alpha particles beta particles or gamma rays material of a high atomic number and with high density makes for good shielding frequently lead is used However this approach will not work with neutrons since the absorption of neutrons does not increase straightforwardly with atomic number as it does with alpha beta and gamma radiation Instead one needs to look at the particular interactions neutrons have with matter see the section on detection above For example hydrogen rich materials are often used to shield against neutrons since ordinary hydrogen both scatters and slows neutrons This often means that simple concrete blocks or even paraffin loaded plastic blocks afford better protection from neutrons than do far more dense materials After slowing neutrons may then be absorbed with an isotope that has high affinity for slow neutrons without causing secondary capture radiation such as lithium 6 Hydrogen rich ordinary water effects neutron absorption in nuclear fission reactors Usually neutrons are so strongly absorbed by normal water that fuel enrichment with a fissionable isotope is required The number of neutrons produced per fission depends primarily on the fission products The average is roughly 2 5 to 3 0 and at least one on average must evade capture in order to sustain the nuclear chain reaction The deuterium in heavy water has a very much lower absorption affinity for neutrons than does protium normal light hydrogen Deuterium is therefore used in CANDU type reactors in order to slow moderate neutron velocity to increase the probability of nuclear fission compared to neutron capture Neutron temperature editMain article Neutron temperature Thermal neutrons edit Thermal neutrons are free neutrons whose energies have a Maxwell Boltzmann distribution with kT 0 0253 eV 4 0 10 21 J at room temperature This gives characteristic not average or median speed of 2 2 km s The name thermal comes from their energy being that of the room temperature gas or material they are permeating see kinetic theory for energies and speeds of molecules After a number of collisions often in the range of 10 20 with nuclei neutrons arrive at this energy level provided that they are not absorbed In many substances thermal neutron reactions show a much larger effective cross section than reactions involving faster neutrons and thermal neutrons can therefore be absorbed more readily i e with higher probability by any atomic nuclei that they collide with creating a heavier and often unstable isotope of the chemical element as a result Most fission reactors use a neutron moderator to slow down or thermalize the neutrons that are emitted by nuclear fission so that they are more easily captured causing further fission Others called fast breeder reactors use fission energy neutrons directly Cold neutrons edit Cold neutrons are thermal neutrons that have been equilibrated in a very cold substance such as liquid deuterium Such a cold source is placed in the moderator of a research reactor or spallation source Cold neutrons are particularly valuable for neutron scattering experiments 105 The use of cold and very cold neutrons VCN have been a bit limited compared to the use of thermal neutrons due to the relatively lower flux and lack in optical components However Innovative solutions have been proposed to offer more options to the scientific community to promote the use of VCN 106 107 nbsp Cold neutron source providing neutrons at about the temperature of liquid hydrogenUltracold neutrons edit Ultracold neutrons are produced by inelastic scattering of cold neutrons in substances with a low neutron absorption cross section at a temperature of a few kelvins such as solid deuterium 108 or superfluid helium 109 An alternative production method is the mechanical deceleration of cold neutrons exploiting the Doppler shift 110 111 Fission energy neutrons edit Main article Nuclear fission A fast neutron is a free neutron with a kinetic energy level close to 1 MeV 1 6 10 13 J hence a speed of 14000 km s 5 of the speed of light They are named fission energy or fast neutrons to distinguish them from lower energy thermal neutrons and high energy neutrons produced in cosmic showers or accelerators Fast neutrons are produced by nuclear processes such as nuclear fission Neutrons produced in fission as noted above have a Maxwell Boltzmann distribution of kinetic energies from 0 to 14 MeV a mean energy of 2 MeV for 235U fission neutrons and a mode of only 0 75 MeV which means that more than half of them do not qualify as fast and thus have almost no chance of initiating fission in fertile materials such as 238U and 232Th Fast neutrons can be made into thermal neutrons via a process called moderation This is done with a neutron moderator In reactors typically heavy water light water or graphite are used to moderate neutrons Fusion neutrons edit nbsp The fusion reaction rate increases rapidly with temperature until it maximizes and then gradually drops off The D T rate peaks at a lower temperature about 70 keV or 800 million kelvins and at a higher value than other reactions commonly considered for fusion energy Further information Nuclear fusion Criteria and candidates for terrestrial reactions D T deuterium tritium fusion is the fusion reaction that produces the most energetic neutrons with 14 1 MeV of kinetic energy and traveling at 17 of the speed of light D T fusion is also the easiest fusion reaction to ignite reaching near peak rates even when the deuterium and tritium nuclei have only a thousandth as much kinetic energy as the 14 1 MeV that will be produced 14 1 MeV neutrons have about 10 times as much energy as fission neutrons and are very effective at fissioning even non fissile heavy nuclei and these high energy fissions produce more neutrons on average than fissions by lower energy neutrons This makes D T fusion neutron sources such as proposed tokamak power reactors useful for transmutation of transuranic waste 14 1 MeV neutrons can also produce neutrons by knocking them loose from nuclei On the other hand these very high energy neutrons are less likely to simply be captured without causing fission or spallation For these reasons nuclear weapon design extensively uses D T fusion 14 1 MeV neutrons to cause more fission Fusion neutrons are able to cause fission in ordinarily non fissile materials such as depleted uranium uranium 238 and these materials have been used in the jackets of thermonuclear weapons Fusion neutrons also can cause fission in substances that are unsuitable or difficult to make into primary fission bombs such as reactor grade plutonium This physical fact thus causes ordinary non weapons grade materials to become of concern in certain nuclear proliferation discussions and treaties Other fusion reactions produce much less energetic neutrons D D fusion produces a 2 45 MeV neutron and helium 3 half of the time and produces tritium and a proton but no neutron the rest of the time D 3He fusion produces no neutron Intermediate energy neutrons edit nbsp Transmutation flow in light water reactor which is a thermal spectrum reactorA fission energy neutron that has slowed down but not yet reached thermal energies is called an epithermal neutron Cross sections for both capture and fission reactions often have multiple resonance peaks at specific energies in the epithermal energy range These are of less significance in a fast neutron reactor where most neutrons are absorbed before slowing down to this range or in a well moderated thermal reactor where epithermal neutrons interact mostly with moderator nuclei not with either fissile or fertile actinide nuclides But in a partially moderated reactor with more interactions of epithermal neutrons with heavy metal nuclei there are greater possibilities for transient changes in reactivity that might make reactor control more difficult Ratios of capture reactions to fission reactions are also worse more captures without fission in most nuclear fuels such as plutonium 239 making epithermal spectrum reactors using these fuels less desirable as captures not only waste the one neutron captured but also usually result in a nuclide that is not fissile with thermal or epithermal neutrons though still fissionable with fast neutrons The exception is uranium 233 of the thorium cycle which has good capture fission ratios at all neutron energies High energy neutrons edit High energy neutrons have much more energy than fission energy neutrons and are generated as secondary particles by particle accelerators or in the atmosphere from cosmic rays These high energy neutrons are extremely efficient at ionization and far more likely to cause cell death than X rays or protons 112 113 See also edit nbsp Wikimedia Commons has media related to Neutrons Ionizing radiation Isotope List of particles Neutron radiation and the Sievert radiation scale Neutronium Nuclear reaction Nucleosynthesis Neutron capture nucleosynthesis R process S process Thermal neutron reactorNeutron sources edit Neutron generator Neutron sourceProcesses involving neutrons edit Neutron bomb Neutron diffraction Neutron flux Neutron transport Cosmogenic radionuclide datingReferences edit Ernest Rutherford Archived 2011 08 03 at the Wayback Machine Chemed chem purdue edu Retrieved on 2012 08 16 a b 1935 Nobel Prize in Physics Archived 2017 10 03 at the Wayback Machine Nobelprize org Retrieved on 2012 08 16 a b 2018 CODATA recommended values https physics nist gov cuu Constants index html Archived 2018 01 22 at the Wayback Machine a b c d e f Mohr P J Taylor B N and Newell D B 2014 The 2014 CODATA Recommended Values of the Fundamental Physical Constants Archived 2013 10 09 at the Wayback Machine Web Version 7 0 The database was developed by J Baker M Douma and S Kotochigova 2014 National Institute of Standards and Technology Gaithersburg Maryland 20899 Zyla P A 2020 n MEAN LIFE PDG Live 2020 Review of Particle Physics Particle Data Group Archived from the original on 17 January 2021 Retrieved 25 February 2021 a b Olive K A Particle Data Group et al 2014 Review of Particle Physics PDF Chinese Physics C 38 9 1 708 arXiv 1412 1408 Bibcode 2014ChPhC 38i0001O doi 10 1088 1674 1137 38 9 090001 PMID 10020536 S2CID 118395784 Archived PDF from the original on 2020 06 01 Retrieved 2017 10 26 a b c Glasstone Samuel Dolan Philip J eds 1977 The Effects of Nuclear Weapons 3rd ed U S Dept of Defense and Energy Research and Development Administration U S Government Printing Office ISBN 978 1 60322 016 3 Giancoli Douglas C 1984 General physics Englewood Cliffs N J Prentice Hall ISBN 978 0 13 350884 0 OCLC 1033640549 Nudat 2 Archived 2009 08 17 at the Wayback Machine Nndc bnl gov Retrieved on 2010 12 04 Thomas A W Weise W 2001 The Structure of the Nucleon Wiley WCH Berlin ISBN 978 3 527 40297 7 Particle Data Group Summary Data Table on Baryons Archived 2011 09 10 at the Wayback Machine lbl gov 2007 Retrieved on 2012 08 16 Povh B Rith K Scholz C Zetsche F 2002 Particles and Nuclei An Introduction to the Physical Concepts Berlin Springer Verlag p 73 ISBN 978 3 540 43823 6 Basdevant J L Rich J Spiro M 2005 Fundamentals in Nuclear Physics Springer p 155 ISBN 978 0 387 01672 6 a b Nakamura K 2010 Review of Particle Physics Journal of Physics G 37 7A 1 708 Bibcode 2010JPhG 37g5021N doi 10 1088 0954 3899 37 7A 075021 hdl 10481 34593 PMID 10020536 PDF with 2011 partial update for the 2012 edition Archived 2012 09 20 at the Wayback Machine The exact value of the mean lifetime is still uncertain due to conflicting results from experiments The Particle Data Group reports values up to six seconds apart more than four standard deviations commenting that our 2006 2008 and 2010 Reviews stayed with 885 7 0 8 s but we noted that in light of SEREBROV 05 our value should be regarded as suspect until further experiments clarified matters Since our 2010 Review PICHLMAIER 10 has obtained a mean life of 880 7 1 8 s closer to the value of SEREBROV 05 than to our average And SEREBROV 10B claims their values should be lowered by about 6 s which would bring them into line with the two lower values But those re evaluations have not received an enthusiastic response from the experimenters in question and in any case the Particle Data Group would have to await published changes by those experimenters of published values At this point we can think of nothing better to do than to average the seven best but discordant measurements getting 881 5 1 5 s Note that the error includes a scale factor of 2 7 This is a jump of 4 2 old and 2 8 new standard deviations This state of affairs is a particularly unhappy one because the value is so important We again call upon the experimenters to clear this up Tanabashi M 2018 The Review of Particle Physics Physical Review D 54 1 1653 doi 10 1103 physrevd 54 1 PMID 10020536 Archived from the original on 2020 10 19 Retrieved 2020 10 14 Basic Ideas and Concepts in Nuclear Physics An Introductory Approach Third Edition K Heyde Taylor amp Francis 2004 Print ISBN 978 0 7503 0980 6 978 1 4200 5494 1 doi 10 1201 9781420054941 full text permanent dead link Sir James Chadwick s Discovery of Neutrons Archived 2011 10 26 at the Wayback Machine ANS Nuclear Cafe Retrieved on 2012 08 16 Adair R K 1989 The Great Design Particles Fields and Creation Oxford University Press p 214 Bibcode 1988gdpf book A Cottingham W N Greenwood D A 1986 An Introduction to Nuclear Physics Cambridge University Press ISBN 9780521657334 a b Rutherford E 1920 Nuclear Constitution of Atoms Proceedings of the Royal Society A 97 686 374 400 Bibcode 1920RSPSA 97 374R doi 10 1098 rspa 1920 0040 Harkins William 1921 The constitution and stability of atomic nuclei A contribution to the subject of inorganic evolution Philos Mag 42 249 305 doi 10 1080 14786442108633770 a b Feather N 1960 A history of neutrons and nuclei Part 1 Contemporary Physics 1 3 191 203 Bibcode 1960ConPh 1 191F doi 10 1080 00107516008202611 Pauli Wolfgang Hermann A Meyenn K v Weisskopff V F 1985 Das Jahr 1932 die Entdeckung des Neutrons Wolfgang Pauli Sources in the History of Mathematics and Physical Sciences Vol 6 pp 105 144 doi 10 1007 978 3 540 78801 0 3 ISBN 978 3 540 13609 5 Hendry John ed 1984 Cambridge Physics in the Thirties Bristol Adam Hilger ISBN 978 0852747612 Brown Laurie M 1978 The idea of the neutrino Physics Today 31 9 23 28 Bibcode 1978PhT 31i 23B doi 10 1063 1 2995181 Friedlander G Kennedy J W and Miller J M 1964 Nuclear and Radiochemistry 2nd edition Wiley pp 22 23 and 38 39 a b Stuewer Roger H 1985 Niels Bohr and Nuclear Physics In French A P Kennedy P J eds Niels Bohr A Centenary Volume Harvard University Press pp 197 220 ISBN 978 0674624160 Pais Abraham 1986 Inward Bound Oxford Oxford University Press p 299 ISBN 978 0198519973 Klein O 1929 Die Reflexion von Elektronen an einem Potentialsprung nach der relativistischen Dynamik von Dirac Zeitschrift fur Physik 53 3 4 157 165 Bibcode 1929ZPhy 53 157K doi 10 1007 BF01339716 S2CID 121771000 Bothe W Becker H 1930 Kunstliche Erregung von Kern g Strahlen Artificial excitation of nuclear g radiation Zeitschrift fur Physik 66 5 6 289 306 Bibcode 1930ZPhy 66 289B doi 10 1007 BF01390908 S2CID 122888356 Becker H Bothe W 1932 Die in Bor und Beryllium erregten g Strahlen G rays excited in boron and beryllium Zeitschrift fur Physik 76 7 8 421 438 Bibcode 1932ZPhy 76 421B doi 10 1007 BF01336726 S2CID 121188471 Joliot Curie Irene amp Joliot Frederic 1932 Emission de protons de grande vitesse par les substances hydrogenees sous l influence des rayons g tres penetrants Emission of high speed protons by hydrogenated substances under the influence of very penetrating g rays Comptes Rendus 194 273 Archived from the original on 2022 03 04 Retrieved 2012 06 16 Brown Andrew 1997 The Neutron and the Bomb A Biography of Sir James Chadwick Oxford University Press ISBN 978 0 19 853992 6 Chadwick James 1932 Possible Existence of a Neutron PDF Nature 129 3252 312 Bibcode 1932Natur 129Q 312C doi 10 1038 129312a0 S2CID 4076465 Atop the Physics Wave Rutherford Back in Cambridge 1919 1937 Rutherford s Nuclear World American Institute of Physics 2011 2014 Archived from the original on 21 October 2014 Retrieved 19 August 2014 Chadwick J 1933 Bakerian Lecture The Neutron Proceedings of the Royal Society A 142 846 1 25 Bibcode 1933RSPSA 142 1C doi 10 1098 rspa 1933 0152 Heisenberg W 1932 Uber den Bau der Atomkerne I Zeitschrift fur Physik 77 1 2 1 11 Bibcode 1932ZPhy 77 1H doi 10 1007 BF01342433 S2CID 186218053 Heisenberg W 1932 Uber den Bau der Atomkerne II Zeitschrift fur Physik 78 3 4 156 164 Bibcode 1932ZPhy 78 156H doi 10 1007 BF01337585 S2CID 186221789 Heisenberg W 1933 Uber den Bau der Atomkerne III Zeitschrift fur Physik 80 9 10 587 596 Bibcode 1933ZPhy 80 587H doi 10 1007 BF01335696 S2CID 126422047 Iwanenko D 1932 The Neutron Hypothesis Nature 129 3265 798 Bibcode 1932Natur 129 798I doi 10 1038 129798d0 S2CID 4096734 Miller A I 1995 Early Quantum Electrodynamics A Sourcebook Cambridge University Press Cambridge ISBN 0521568919 pp 84 88 Wilson Fred L 1968 Fermi s Theory of Beta Decay American Journal of Physics 36 12 1150 1160 Bibcode 1968AmJPh 36 1150W doi 10 1119 1 1974382 Chadwick J Goldhaber M 1934 A nuclear photo effect disintegration of the diplon by gamma rays Nature 134 3381 237 238 Bibcode 1934Natur 134 237C doi 10 1038 134237a0 S2CID 4137231 Chadwick J Goldhaber M 1935 A nuclear photoelectric effect Proceedings of the Royal Society of London A 151 873 479 493 Bibcode 1935RSPSA 151 479C doi 10 1098 rspa 1935 0162 Cooper Dan 1999 Enrico Fermi And the Revolutions in Modern physics New York Oxford University Press ISBN 978 0 19 511762 2 OCLC 39508200 Hahn O amp Strassmann F 1939 Uber den Nachweis und das Verhalten der bei der Bestrahlung des Urans mittels Neutronen entstehenden Erdalkalimetalle On the detection and characteristics of the alkaline earth metals formed by irradiation of uranium with neutrons Die Naturwissenschaften 27 1 11 15 Bibcode 1939NW 27 11H doi 10 1007 BF01488241 S2CID 5920336 Hahn O 1958 The Discovery of Fission Scientific American 198 2 76 84 Bibcode 1958SciAm 198b 76H doi 10 1038 scientificamerican0258 76 Rife Patricia 1999 Lise Meitner and the dawn of the nuclear age Basel Switzerland Birkhauser ISBN 978 0 8176 3732 3 Hahn O Strassmann F 10 February 1939 Proof of the Formation of Active Isotopes of Barium from Uranium and Thorium Irradiated with Neutrons Proof of the Existence of More Active Fragments Produced by Uranium Fission Die Naturwissenschaften 27 6 89 95 Bibcode 1939NW 27 89H doi 10 1007 BF01488988 S2CID 33512939 The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1944 Nobel Foundation Archived from the original on 2018 12 26 Retrieved 2007 12 17 Bernstein Jeremy 2001 Hitler s uranium club the secret recordings at Farm Hall New York Copernicus p 281 ISBN 978 0 387 95089 1 The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1944 Presentation Speech Nobel Foundation Archived from the original on 2007 10 25 Retrieved 2008 01 03 Greene GL et al 1986 New determination of the deuteron binding energy and the neutron mass Physical Review Letters 56 8 819 822 Bibcode 1986PhRvL 56 819G doi 10 1103 PhysRevLett 56 819 PMID 10033294 Byrne J Neutrons Nuclei and Matter Dover Publications Mineola New York 2011 ISBN 0486482383 pp 18 19 a b J Byrne 2011 Neutrons Nuclei and Matter An exploration of the physics of slow neutrons Mineola NY Dover Publications pp 28 31 ISBN 978 0486482385 Hughes D J Burgy M T 1949 Reflection and polarization of neutrons by magnetized mirrors PDF Physical Review 76 9 1413 1414 Bibcode 1949PhRv 76 1413H doi 10 1103 PhysRev 76 1413 Archived from the original PDF on 2016 08 13 Retrieved 2016 06 26 Sherwood J E Stephenson T E Bernstein S 1954 Stern Gerlach experiment on polarized neutrons Physical Review 96 6 1546 1548 Bibcode 1954PhRv 96 1546S doi 10 1103 PhysRev 96 1546 Bombaci I 1996 The Maximum Mass of a Neutron Star Astronomy and Astrophysics 305 871 877 Bibcode 1996A amp A 305 871B Alvarez L W Bloch F 1940 A quantitative determination of the neutron magnetic moment in absolute nuclear magnetons Physical Review 57 2 111 122 Bibcode 1940PhRv 57 111A doi 10 1103 physrev 57 111 Tipler Paul Allen Llewellyn Ralph A 2002 Modern Physics 4 ed Macmillan p 310 ISBN 978 0 7167 4345 3 Archived from the original on 2022 04 07 Retrieved 2020 08 27 a b Gell Y Lichtenberg D B 1969 Quark model and the magnetic moments of proton and neutron Il Nuovo Cimento A Series 10 61 1 27 40 Bibcode 1969NCimA 61 27G doi 10 1007 BF02760010 S2CID 123822660 a b c Perkins Donald H 1982 Introduction to High Energy Physics Addison Wesley Reading Massachusetts pp 201 202 ISBN 978 0 201 05757 7 Greenberg O W 2009 Color Charge Degree of Freedom in Particle Physics Compendium of Quantum Physics Springer Berlin Heidelberg pp 109 111 arXiv 0805 0289 doi 10 1007 978 3 540 70626 7 32 ISBN 978 3 540 70622 9 S2CID 17512393 Beg M A B Lee B W Pais A 1964 SU 6 and electromagnetic interactions Physical Review Letters 13 16 514 517 erratum 650 Bibcode 1964PhRvL 13 514B doi 10 1103 physrevlett 13 514 Sakita B 1964 Electromagnetic properties of baryons in the supermultiplet scheme of elementary particles Physical Review Letters 13 21 643 646 Bibcode 1964PhRvL 13 643S doi 10 1103 physrevlett 13 643 a b Cho Adrian 2 April 2010 Mass of the Common Quark Finally Nailed Down Science American Association for the Advancement of Science Archived from the original on 27 August 2015 Retrieved 27 September 2014 Wilczek F 2003 The Origin of Mass PDF MIT Physics Annual 24 35 Archived PDF from the original on June 20 2015 Ji Xiangdong 1995 A QCD Analysis of the Mass Structure of the Nucleon Physical Review Letters 74 7 1071 1074 arXiv hep ph 9410274 Bibcode 1995PhRvL 74 1071J doi 10 1103 PhysRevLett 74 1071 PMID 10058927 S2CID 15148740 Martinelli G Parisi G Petronzio R Rapuano F 1982 The proton and neutron magnetic moments in lattice QCD PDF Physics Letters B 116 6 434 436 Bibcode 1982PhLB 116 434M doi 10 1016 0370 2693 82 90162 9 Archived PDF from the original on 2020 04 20 Retrieved 2019 08 25 Kincade Kathy 2 February 2015 Pinpointing the magnetic moments of nuclear matter Phys org Archived from the original on 2 May 2015 Retrieved May 8 2015 Miller G A 2007 Charge Densities of the Neutron and Proton Physical Review Letters 99 11 112001 arXiv 0705 2409 Bibcode 2007PhRvL 99k2001M doi 10 1103 PhysRevLett 99 112001 PMID 17930428 S2CID 119120565 Pear shaped particles probe big bang mystery Press release University of Sussex 20 February 2006 Archived from the original on 2011 06 07 Retrieved 2009 12 14 A cryogenic experiment to search for the EDM of the neutron Archived 2012 02 16 at the Wayback Machine Hepwww rl ac uk Retrieved on 2012 08 16 Search for the neutron electric dipole moment nEDM Archived 2015 09 25 at the Wayback Machine Nedm web psi ch 2001 09 12 Retrieved on 2012 08 16 US nEDM ORNL experiment public page Archived 2017 04 30 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved on 2017 02 08 SNS Neutron EDM Experiment Archived 2011 02 10 at the Wayback Machine P25ext lanl gov Retrieved on 2012 08 16 Measurement of the Neutron Electric Dipole Moment Archived 2011 08 23 at the Wayback Machine Nrd pnpi spb ru Retrieved on 2012 08 16 Thoennessen Michael 2016 Unbound Isotopes Cham Springer International Publishing pp 275 291 doi 10 1007 978 3 319 31763 2 16 ISBN 978 3 319 31761 8 Spyrou A et al 2012 First Observation of Ground State Dineutron Decay 16Be Physical Review Letters 108 10 102501 Bibcode 2012PhRvL 108j2501S doi 10 1103 PhysRevLett 108 102501 PMID 22463404 Marques F M Labiche M Orr N A Angelique J C Axelsson L Benoit B Bergmann U C Borge M J G Catford W N Chappell S P G Clarke N M Costa G Curtis N D Arrigo A de Goes Brennand E 2002 04 01 Detection of neutron clusters Physical Review C 65 4 arXiv nucl ex 0111001 doi 10 1103 PhysRevC 65 044006 ISSN 0556 2813 Kisamori K et al 2016 Candidate Resonant Tetraneutron State Populated by the He4 He8 Be8 Reaction Physical Review Letters 116 5 052501 Bibcode 2016PhRvL 116e2501K doi 10 1103 PhysRevLett 116 052501 PMID 26894705 Duer M Aumann T Gernhauser R Panin V Paschalis S Rossi D M Achouri N L Ahn D Baba H Bertulani C A Bohmer M Boretzky K Caesar C Chiga N Corsi A 2022 06 23 Observation of a correlated free four neutron system Nature 606 7915 678 682 doi 10 1038 s41586 022 04827 6 ISSN 0028 0836 PMC 9217746 PMID 35732764 Physicists find signs of four neutron nucleus 2016 02 24 Archived from the original on 2017 07 29 Retrieved 2017 06 27 Orr Nigel 2016 02 03 Can Four Neutrons Tango Physics 9 14 Bibcode 2016PhyOJ 9 14O doi 10 1103 Physics 9 14 Gandolfi Stefano Gezerlis Alexandros Carlson J 2015 10 19 Neutron Matter from Low to High Density Annual Review of Nuclear and Particle Science 65 1 303 328 arXiv 1501 05675 doi 10 1146 annurev nucl 102014 021957 ISSN 0163 8998 Llanes Estrada Felipe J Moreno Navarro Gaspar 2012 Cubic neutrons Modern Physics Letters A 27 6 1250033 1 1250033 7 arXiv 1108 1859 Bibcode 2012MPLA 2750033L doi 10 1142 S0217732312500332 S2CID 118407306 Knoll Glenn F 1979 Ch 14 Radiation Detection and Measurement John Wiley amp Sons ISBN 978 0471495451 Ghosh P W Fu M J Harrison P K Doyle N S Edwards J A Roberts D S McGregor 2018 A high efficiency low Ĉerenkov Micro Layered Fast Neutron Detector for the TREAT hodoscope Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A 904 100 106 Bibcode 2018NIMPA 904 100G doi 10 1016 j nima 2018 07 035 S2CID 126130994 Archived from the original on 2022 04 12 Retrieved 2020 04 14 Ghosh P D M Nichols W Fu J A Roberts D S McGregor 2019 Gamma Ray Rejection of the SiPM coupled Micro Layered Fast Neutron Detector 2019 IEEE Nuclear Science Symposium and Medical Imaging Conference NSS MIC pp 1 3 doi 10 1109 NSS MIC42101 2019 9059869 ISBN 978 1 7281 4164 0 S2CID 204877955 a b Carson M J et al 2004 Neutron background in large scale xenon detectors for dark matter searches Astroparticle Physics 21 6 667 687 arXiv hep ex 0404042 Bibcode 2004APh 21 667C doi 10 1016 j astropartphys 2004 05 001 S2CID 17887096 Kohn C Ebert U 2015 Calculation of beams of positrons neutrons and protons associated with terrestrial gamma ray flashes PDF Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 23 4 1620 1635 Bibcode 2015JGRD 120 1620K doi 10 1002 2014JD022229 Archived PDF from the original on 2019 12 23 Retrieved 2019 08 25 Kohn C Diniz G Harakeh Muhsin 2017 Production mechanisms of leptons photons and hadrons and their possible feedback close to lightning leaders Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 122 2 1365 1383 Bibcode 2017JGRD 122 1365K doi 10 1002 2016JD025445 PMC 5349290 PMID 28357174 Clowdsley MS Wilson JW Kim MH Singleterry RC Tripathi RK Heinbockel JH Badavi FF Shinn JL 2001 Neutron Environments on the Martian Surface PDF Physica Medica 17 Suppl 1 94 96 PMID 11770546 Archived from the original PDF on 2005 02 25 Byrne J Neutrons Nuclei and Matter Dover Publications Mineola New York 2011 ISBN 0486482383 pp 32 33 Isotopes and Radioactivity Tutorial Archived from the original on 2020 02 14 Retrieved 2020 04 16 Science Nature Q amp A Nuclear fusion reactor Archived 2022 02 25 at the Wayback Machine BBC News 2006 02 06 Retrieved on 2010 12 04 Byrne J Neutrons Nuclei and Matter Dover Publications Mineola New York 2011 ISBN 0486482383 p 453 Klein A G Werner S A 1983 03 01 Neutron optics Reports on Progress in Physics IOP Publishing 46 3 259 335 doi 10 1088 0034 4885 46 3 001 ISSN 0034 4885 S2CID 250903152 Kumakhov M A Sharov V A 1992 A neutron lens Nature 357 6377 390 391 Bibcode 1992Natur 357 390K doi 10 1038 357390a0 S2CID 37062511 Physorg com New Way of Seeing A Neutron Microscope Archived 2012 01 24 at the Wayback Machine Physorg com 2004 07 30 Retrieved on 2012 08 16 NASA Develops a Nugget to Search for Life in Space Archived 2014 03 08 at the Wayback Machine NASA gov 2007 11 30 Retrieved on 2012 08 16 Ioffe A Dabagov S Kumakhov M 1995 01 01 Effective neutron bending at large angles Neutron News 6 3 20 21 doi 10 1080 10448639508217696 ISSN 1044 8632 Hall Eric J 2000 Radiobiology for the radiologist 5th ed Philadelphia Lippincott Williams amp Wilkins ISBN 0 7817 2649 2 OCLC 43854159 Johns HE and Cunningham JR 1978 The Physics of Radiology Charles C Thomas 3rd edition brian maranville nist gov 2017 04 17 How neutrons are useful NIST Archived from the original on 2021 01 25 Retrieved 2021 01 21 E Hadden Y Iso A Kume K Umemoto T Jenke M Fally J Klepp Y Tomita 2022 Highly efficient holographic optical elements for cold neutron experiments ResearchGate doi 10 13140 RG 2 2 26033 04963 Hadden Elhoucine Iso Yuko Kume Atsushi Umemoto Koichi Jenke Tobias Fally Martin Klepp Jurgen Tomita Yasuo 2022 05 24 Nanodiamond based nanoparticle polymer composite gratings with extremely large neutron refractive index modulation In McLeod Robert R Tomita Yasuo Sheridan John T Pascual Villalobos Inmaculada eds Photosensitive Materials and their Applications II Vol 12151 SPIE pp 70 76 Bibcode 2022SPIE12151E 09H doi 10 1117 12 2623661 ISBN 9781510651784 S2CID 249056691 B Lauss May 2012 Startup of the high intensity ultracold neutron source at the Paul Scherrer Institute Hyperfine Interact 211 1 21 25 arXiv 1202 6003 Bibcode 2012HyInt 211 21L doi 10 1007 s10751 012 0578 7 S2CID 119164071 R Golub amp J M Pendlebury 1977 The interaction of Ultra Cold Neutrons UCN with liquid helium and a superthermal UCN source Phys Lett A 62 5 337 339 Bibcode 1977PhLA 62 337G doi 10 1016 0375 9601 77 90434 0 A Steyerl H Nagel F X Schreiber K A Steinhauser R Gahler W Glaser P Ageron J M Astruc W Drexel G Gervais amp W Mampe 1986 A new source of cold and ultracold neutrons Phys Lett A 116 7 347 352 Bibcode 1986PhLA 116 347S doi 10 1016 0375 9601 86 90587 6 Stefan Doge Jurgen Hingerl amp Christoph Morkel Feb 2020 Measured velocity spectra and neutron densities of the PF2 ultracold neutron beam ports at the Institut Laue Langevin Nucl Instrum Methods A 953 163112 arXiv 2001 04538 Bibcode 2020NIMPA 95363112D doi 10 1016 j nima 2019 163112 S2CID 209942845 Archived from the original on 2021 02 24 Retrieved 2020 04 24 Freeman Tami May 23 2008 Facing up to secondary neutrons Medical Physics Web Archived from the original on 2010 12 20 Retrieved 2011 02 08 Heilbronn L Nakamura T Iwata Y Kurosawa T Iwase H Townsend LW 2005 Expand Overview of secondary neutron production relevant to shielding in space Radiation Protection Dosimetry 116 1 4 140 143 doi 10 1093 rpd nci033 PMID 16604615 Archived from the original on 2019 01 26 Retrieved 2019 01 25 Further reading editJames Byrne Neutrons Nuclei and Matter An Exploration of the Physics of Slow Neutrons Mineola New York Dover Publications 2011 ISBN 0486482383 Abraham Pais Inward Bound Oxford Oxford University Press 1986 ISBN 0198519974 Sin Itiro Tomonaga The Story of Spin The University of Chicago Press 1997 Herwig Schopper Weak interactions and nuclear beta decay Publisher North Holland Pub Co 1966 Annotated bibliography for neutrons from the Alsos Digital Library for Nuclear Issues Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Neutron amp oldid 1205968726, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

article

, read, download, free, free download, mp3, video, mp4, 3gp, jpg, jpeg, gif, png, picture, music, song, movie, book, game, games.