Inverse Kinematic Study of the (26g)Al(d,p)(27)Al Reaction and Implications for Destruction of (26)Al in Wolf-Rayet and Asymptotic Giant Branch Stars

V Margerin; G Lotay; P J Woods; M Aliotta; G Christian; B Davids; T Davinson; D T Doherty; J Fallis; D Howell; O S Kirsebom; D J Mountford; A Rojas; C Ruiz; J A Tostevin

doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.115.062701

Inverse Kinematic Study of the (26g)Al(d,p)(27)Al Reaction and Implications for Destruction of (26)Al in Wolf-Rayet and Asymptotic Giant Branch Stars

Phys Rev Lett. 2015 Aug 7;115(6):062701. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.115.062701. Epub 2015 Aug 5.

Authors

V Margerin¹, G Lotay^{1

2

3}, P J Woods¹, M Aliotta¹, G Christian⁴, B Davids⁴, T Davinson¹, D T Doherty¹, J Fallis⁴, D Howell⁴, O S Kirsebom⁴, D J Mountford¹, A Rojas⁴, C Ruiz⁴, J A Tostevin²

Affiliations

¹ School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, EH9 3FD, United Kingdom.
² Department of Physics, University of Surrey, Guildford GU2 7XH, United Kingdom.
³ National Physical Laboratory, Teddington, Middlesex TW11 0LW, United Kingdom.
⁴ TRIUMF, Vancouver, British Columbia V6T 2A3, Canada.

PMID: 26296114
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.115.062701

Abstract

In Wolf-Rayet and asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars, the (26g)Al(p,γ)(27)Si reaction is expected to govern the destruction of the cosmic γ-ray emitting nucleus (26)Al. The rate of this reaction, however, is highly uncertain due to the unknown properties of key resonances in the temperature regime of hydrogen burning. We present a high-resolution inverse kinematic study of the (26g)Al(d,p)(27)Al reaction as a method for constraining the strengths of key astrophysical resonances in the (26g)Al(p,γ)(27)Si reaction. In particular, the results indicate that the resonance at E(r)=127 keV in (27)Si determines the entire (26g)Al(p,γ)(27)Si reaction rate over almost the complete temperature range of Wolf-Rayet stars and AGB stars.