Simultaneous Determination of Neutron-Induced Fission and Radiative Capture Cross Sections from Decay Probabilities Obtained with a Surrogate Reaction.

Reliable neutron-induced-reaction cross sections of unstable nuclei are essential for nuclear astrophysics and applications but their direct measurement is often impossible. The surrogate-reaction method is one of the most promising alternatives to access these cross sections. In this work, we successfully applied the surrogate-reaction method to infer for the first time both the neutron-induced fission and radiative capture cross sections of ^{239}Pu in a consistent manner from a single measurement. This was achieved by combining simultaneously measured fission and γ-emission probabilities for the ^{240}Pu(^{4}He,^{4}He^{'}) surrogate reaction with a calculation of the angular-momentum and parity distributions populated in this reaction. While other experiments measure the probabilities for some selected γ-ray transitions, we measure the γ-emission probability. This enlarges the applicability of the surrogate-reaction method.

SUBCHRONIC MANCOZEB TREATEMENT INDUCED LIVER TOXICITY VIA OXIDATIVE STRESS IN MALE WISTAR RATS.

Mancozeb is a manganese/zinc ethylene-bis-dithiocarbamate fungicide that is widely used in agriculture to control a broad variety of fungal infections of both vegetables and ornamental plants. The present study has been carried out to investigate the possible effect of mancozeb on animal the oxidative stress and some of the biochemical markers in male Wistar rats. In this experiment, adult male rats weighing between 200 and 250 g were treated per os for 4 weeks with two different doses of 800 and 1200 mg/kg per day. Reduced glutathione (GSH) levels were decreased in all treated groups compared to control ones. It has been observed a significant increase in the fresh weight of liver in individuals of both doses. Moreover, mancozeb exposure caused a significant (p < 0.05) fall in aspartic aminotransferase (AST) and alanine aminotransferase (ALT) in group treated with 1200 and 800 mg/kg/day. Similarly, alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity underwent a significant (p < 0.05) increase in both groups. The obtained observations clearly reveal hepatotoxic effects of mancozeb in rats and constitute, therefore, an environmental health risks to living organisms.

The Neutrons for Science Facility at SPIRAL-2.

The neutrons for science (NFS) facility is a component of SPIRAL-2, the new superconducting linear accelerator built at GANIL in Caen (France). The proton and deuteron beams delivered by the accelerator will allow producing intense neutron fields in the 100 keV-40 MeV energy range. Continuous and quasi-mono-kinetic energy spectra, respectively, will be available at NFS, produced by the interaction of a deuteron beam on a thick Be converter and by the 7Li(p,n) reaction on thin converter. The pulsed neutron beam, with a flux up to two orders of magnitude higher than those of other existing time-of-flight facilities, will open new opportunities of experiments in fundamental research as well as in nuclear data measurements. In addition to the neutron beam, irradiation stations for neutron-, proton- and deuteron-induced reactions will be available for cross-sections measurements and for the irradiation of electronic devices or biological cells. NFS, whose first experiment is foreseen in 2018, will be a very powerful tool for physics, fundamental research as well as applications like the transmutation of nuclear waste, design of future fission and fusion reactors, nuclear medicine or test and development of new detectors.