Influence of secondary decay on isotope-ratio temperature measurements

Abstract

Influence of sequential decay on nuclear temperature measurements is studied. Particular attention is paid to the contribution of higher-energy resonances and to the role of the primary charge distribution. Results of calculations show that temperatures extracted from the measured double isotope ratios are strongly affected at temperatures beyond 6 MeV. The fluctuations between different isotope thermometers observed in the experiment seem mainly due to structure effects in the secondary decay process.