A Superthermal Source at NCState University

North Carolina State University, Raleigh NC

Investigators

Abstract

We are undertaking a program to construct a world-class, superthermal ultracold neutron (UCN) source at a low power, university-based reactor. In the past five years, research groups at Los Alamos National Laboratory and the National Institute of Standards and Technology in the United States have made great strides in the development of superthermal UCN sources, demonstrating convincingly that the physics of these sources is understood. Orders of magnitude improvement in available UCN densities with superthermal sources may be within reach. The proposed source will be comparable in strength to essentially all of the facilities currently being planned in the U.S. and abroad, and considerably stronger than any presently operating source. The collaboration comprises nuclear physicists involved in fundamental symmetries research and nuclear engineers who specialize in reactor cold source and moderator development. Research programs using low-energy neutrons are driven by the proven usefulness of UCNs for fundamental nuclear physics measurements, such as placing limits on the static electric dipole moments of nucleons and the measurement of the charged weak current form factors of the nucleon. These measurements have impact on some of the deepest and most fundamental questions confronted by physics today. With the increased UCN flux available at superthermal sources, the development of new applications for UCN as non-destructive probes of surface hydrogen layers and large biological molecules may also be posssible.