Commissioning of the neutron+charged-particle coincidence setup at FSU. Valarie Milton, Sergio Almaraz-Calderon, Ashton Morelock Department of Physics, Florida State University.

Many of the nuclear reactions important for explosive nucleosynthesis scenarios in the cosmos proceed through resonant states in exotic nuclei. In order to calculate the rate of these reactions and linked them with observables like for example, energy generation, light curves, isotopic and elemental abundances in the stars; information on the properties of the relevant resonances is needed. Such information includes the energy of the resonance, spin-parity, and partial and total widths.

At the John D. Fox accelerator laboratory at Florida State University, we are developing a setup that will allow us to measure charged particles from the decay of resonant states in exotic nuclei. States of interest will be populated via (³He,n) reaction. The states of interest will be tagged using the CATRiNA neutron array which consists of 32 deuterated benzene liquid scintillators. Charged particles decaying from states above the particle threshold will be measured in a compact array of silicon detectors in coincidences with the neutrons from the reaction. In this talk, the commissioning of the experimental setup will be discussed as well as preliminary results.