Lifetime Measurements of Levels in $^{160}$Gd

The rare earth region of nuclei has been well established as a region of deformation for decades. However, the nature of vibrations built on a deformed ground state remain far from understood and present an oustanding challenge to nuclear structure physics. Studies of $^{158}$Gd has shown a preponderance of excited 0$^{+}$ states with varying degrees of collectivity. We have measured level lifetimes, reduced transition probabilities and angular distributions of gamma-rays excited by inelastic neutron scattering and the use of the Doppler Shift Attenuation Method (DSAM) at the University of Kentucky 7 MV Van de Graaff Accelerator Facility. Low lying excited states of $^{160}$Gd were populated up to an excitation energy of E $<$ 2 MeV. We will present and discuss the measured level lifetimes of $^{160}$Gd and their implied degrees of collectivity. This work was supported by the NSF under contract numbers PHY-1068192, PHY-12-05412, and PHY-0956310.