https://doi.org/10.1051/epjap/2022210270
Regular Article
Separation of manganese isotopes by resonance ionization mass spectrometry for 53Mn half-life determination
1
Institut für Physik, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz,
55099
Mainz,
Germany
2
GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH,
64291
Darmstadt,
Germany
3
Helmholtz Institut Mainz,
Staudingerweg 7,
55128
Mainz,
Germany
4
Paul Scherrer Institut,
Forschungsstrasse 111,
5232
Villigen PSI,
Switzerland
* e-mail: nina.kneip@uni-mainz.de
Received:
29
November
2021
Received in final form:
14
January
2022
Accepted:
17
January
2022
Published online: 11 March 2022
We report on the production of ultra-pure samples of the long-lived radioisotope 53Mn for precision measurements of its half-life. Activated samples from a copper beam dump from PSI, which was irradiated with 590 MeV protons, were used for extraction of the manganese fraction. Following initial radiochemical purification, efficient three-photon laser resonance ionization of manganese inside a hot-cavity laser ion source was applied for subsequent isotope selection in a 30 keV high transmission magnetic mass separator. A new ionization scheme was developed and characterized for 53Mn implantation. In this way the isobar 53Cr and the Mn isotopes 54,55Mn are quantitavely removed, with a special focus on the radioactive 54Mn isotope. Microgram quantities of 53Mn were implanted into Al targets with an isotopic and isobaric purity of well above 103. An overall efficiency of the enrichment process of about 15% was demonstrated.
© N. Kneip et al., published by EDP Sciences, 2022
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
