Status and future directions for direct cross-section measurements of the 13C(α,n)16O reaction for astrophysics

The 13C(α,n)16O reaction is the main neutron source of the s-process taking place in thermally pulsing AGB stars and it is one of the main candidate sources of neutrons for the i-process in the astrophysical sites proposed so far. Therefore, its rate is crucial to understand the production of the nuclei heavier than iron in the Universe. For the first time, the LUNA collaboration was able to measure the 13C(α,n)16O cross section at Ec.m. = 0.23−0.3 MeV drastically reducing the uncertainty of the S(E)-factor in the astrophysically relevant energy range. In this paper, we provide details and critical thoughts about the LUNA measurement and compare them with the current understanding of the 13C(α,n)16O reaction in view of future prospect for higher energy measurements. The two very recent results (from the University of Notre Dame and the JUNA collaboration) published after the LUNA data represent an important step forward. There is, however, still room for a lot of improvement in the experimental study of the 13C(α,n)16O reaction, as emphasized in the present manuscript. We conclude that to provide significantly better constraints on the low-energy extrapolation, experimental data need to be provided over a wide energy range, which overlaps with the energy range of current measurements. Furthermore, future experiments need to focus on the proper target characterisation, the determination of neutron detection efficiency having more nuclear physics input, such as angular distribution of the 13C(α,n)16O reaction below Eα < 0.8 MeV and study of nuclear properties of monoenergetic neutron sources and/or via the study of sharp resonances of 13C(α,n)16O. Moreover, comprehensive, multichannel R-matrix analysis with a proper estimate of uncertainty budget of experimental data are still required.