Cross sections for production of longer lived (170,168,167) Tm in 16 MeV proton irradiation of (nat)Er

Reliable assessment of proton induced production of the long lived radionuclide (170)Tm (T(1/2) = 128.6 d) on (nat)Er requires optimized irradiation and measurement conditions as only a weak 84.2 key signal is emitted in its decay. Additional detector shielding helps reducing the contaminating Pb-X rays at that energy. Measuring the excitation function up to 16 MeV, normalized to standard monitor cross sections, and comparison with earlier measured data for (167,168)Tm results in new cross section data with reduced uncertainty. Comparison with values predicted by ALICE-IPPE, EMPIRE II and different versions of TALYS (EAF2007 and TENDL2010) shows rather good agreement for these simple (p,xn) reactions. (C) 2011 Published by Elsevier B.V.