Abstract: The proton-rich isotope Br-68 was discovered in secondary fragmentation reactions of fast radioactive beams. Proton-rich secondary beams of (70,71,72) Kr and Br-70, produced at the RIKEN Nishina Center and identified by the BigRIPS fragment separator, impinged on a secondary Be-9 target. Unambiguous particle identification behind the secondary target was achieved with the ZeroDegree spectrometer. Based on the expected direct production cross sections from neighboring isotopes, the lifetime of the ground or long-lived isomeric state of Br-68 was estimated. The results suggest that secondary fragmentation reactions, where relatively few nucleons are removed from the projectile, offer an alternative way to search for new isotopes, as these reactions populate preferentially low-lying states.

Abstract: We report measurements of the lifetimes of the Lambda(+)(c), Xi(+)(c) and Xi(0)(c) charm baryons using proton- proton collision data at center- of- mass energies of 7 and 8 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 3.0 fb(-1), collected by the LHCb experiment. The charm baryons are reconstructed through the decays Lambda(+)(c) -> pK(-)pi(+),. Xi(+)(c) -> pK(-) pi(+) and Xi(0)(c) -> pK(-) K- pi(+), and originate from semimuonic decays of beauty baryons. The lifetimes are measured relative to that of the D+ meson, and are determined to be tau Lambda(+)(c) = 203.5 +/- 1.0 +/- 1.3 +/- 1.4 fs; tau Xi(+)(c) = 456.8 +/- 3.5 +/- 2.9 +/- 3.1 fs; tau Xi(0)(c) = 154.5 +/- 1.7 +/- 1.6 +/- 1.0 fs; where the uncertainties are statistical, systematic, and due to the uncertainty in the D+ lifetime. The measurements are approximately 3- 4 times more precise than the current world average values. The. +c and Xi(+)(c) lifetimes are in agreement with previous measurements; however, the Xi(0)(c) baryon lifetime is approximately 3.3 standard deviations larger than the world average value.

Abstract: The beta-intensity distributions of the decays of Nb-100gs,Nb-100m and Nb-102gs,Nb-102m have been determined using the total absorption gamma-ray spectroscopy technique. The JYFLTRAP double Penning trap system was employed in a campaign of challenging measurements performed with the decay total absorption gamma-ray spectrometer at the Ion Guide Isotope Separator On-Line facility in Jyvaskyla. Different strategies were applied to disentangle the isomeric states involved, lying very close in energy. The low-spin component of each niobium case was populated through the decay of the zirconium parent, which was treated as a contaminant. We have applied a method to extract this contamination, and additionally we have obtained beta-intensity distributions for these zirconium decays. The beta-strength distributions evaluated with these results were compared with calculations in a quasiparticle random-phase approximation, suggesting a prolate configuration for the ground states of Zr-100,Zr-102. The footprint of the Pandemonium effect was found when comparing our results for the analyses of the niobium isotopes with previous decay data. The beta-intensities of the decay of Nb-102m, for which there were no previous data, were obtained. A careful evaluation of the uncertainties was carried out, and the consistency of our results was validated taking advantage of the segmentation of our spectrometer. The final results were used as input in reactor summation calculations. A large impact on antineutrino spectrum calculations was already reported, and here we detail the significant impact on decay heat calculations.