Ⅲ-3. Radiochemistry & Nuclear Chemistry

RIKEN Accel. Prog. Rep. 53

Production cross sections of (d, x) reactions on natural erbium†
M. U. Khandaker∗1,∗2 and H. Haba∗2
Nowadays, radionuclides find wide applications invarious field such as medicine, industry, agriculture etc.
The production of such radionuclides is performed via
a number of processes, mostly via the use of particle
accelerators and nuclear reactors. Although the use ofparticle accelerators show some advantages over the nuclear reactors, however the production of radionuclides
via former process is still not well practiced. The nuclear reaction cross-sections play a key role in optimization of production parameters for radionuclide of interest via the use of particle accelerators. Present study
concerns the measurement of production cross-sectionsof residual radionuclides via deuteron irradiation on
natural erbium target in the energy range of 4.59–
23.06 MeV. This rare earth metal can also be used as apotential material for the production of some medicallyimportant thulium and erbium radionuclides. As an example, the production of the 167 Tm finds applications
as a tracer for tumor and bone studies by using both
the Anger/gamma camera and the rectilinear scanner.1)
Furthermore, it’s relatively long half-life (T1/2 = 9.25 d)and emission of γ-ray (Eγ = 207.801 keV, Iγ = 42%)and Auger electrons (Auger L = 5.5 keV, 114%) made it
suitable for applications in radionuclide therapy.2) Notethat considering the common drawbacks of (n, γ) production route (carrier added and low specific activity
production), several authors3) studied the production
possibility of thulium radionuclides via light-charged
particles-induced reactions on several targets. However, since a search of literature shows that the status
of deuteron-induced reaction cross-sections on erbium

Fig. 2. Thick target integral yields (physical) for 167, 168 Tm
radionuclides.

is not satisfactory, further study on such processes may
find great significance in various respect.
In these circumstances, this study forms an interest to measure the production cross-sections ofnatEr(d, x)163, 165, 166, 167, 168 Tm and nat Er(d, x)171 Er
nuclear processes from their respective thresholds up to23.06 MeV by using the AVF cyclotron of the RIKEN
RI Beam Factory, Wako, Japan. Details on the irradiation technique, radioactivity determination, and data
evaluation procedures are available in Ref. 4) Owing tothe space limitation of this report, we present only thenatEr(d, x)167 Tm cross sections and the deduced yieldin Figs. 1 and 2, respectively. Measured cross sections
with an overall uncertainty of better than 33% are listedin Ref. 4). The cross-sections were normalized by using
the nat Ti(d, x)48 V monitor cross sections recommendedby IAEA. Measured data were critically compared withthe available literature data, and an overall good agreement was found. However, only partial agreements wereobtained with the data extracted from the TENDL2017 library and Empire-3.2.2 code.
The deduced thick-target yields indicate that a low
amount of no-carrier-added radioactivity of 167 Tm(4.2 MBq/µA-h) could be obtained by irradiating an enriched 167 Er target with 15-MeV deuteron energy froma cyclotron.
References

Fig. 1. Excitation function of the nat Er(d, x)167 Tm reaction.
†∗1∗2

Condensed from Nucl. Instrum. Methods Phys. Res. B 470,1 (2020)
Centre for Biomedical Physics, Sunway University
RIKEN Nishina Center- 185 -1) D. G. Medvedev, L. F. Mausner, G. A. Greene,A. L. Hanson, Appl. Radiat. Isot. 66, 1300 (2008).
2) H. Uusijarvi, P. Bernhardt et al., J. Nucl. Med. 47, 807(2006).
3) F. Tarkanyi, A. Hermanne, F. Ditroi, S. Takacs, Appl.
Radiat. Isot. 135, 67 (2018).
4) M. U. Khandaker, H. Haba et al., Nucl. Instrum. Methods Phys. Res. B 470, 1 (2020).