New determination of the Th-237 half-life - art. no. 067308

Nuclide Th-237 has been produced via multinucleon transfer reactions by 60 MeV/nucleon O-18 ion irradiation of natural uranium. Thorium was radiochemi cally separated from the mixture of uranium and reaction products. The acti vity of thorium was measured by using a HPGe detector. The Th-237 has been identified by measuring the growth and decay of the gamma rays from its dau ghter Pa-237. The hair-life of Th-237 was determined to be 4.69+/-0.60 min. Not only is the new value in agreement with the earlier one of 5.0+/-0.9 m in obtained in our previous work, but also its experimental precision was i mproved.