Investigation of proton induced reactions on niobium at low and medium energies

Niobium is a metal with important technological applications: use as alloying element to increase strength of super alloys, as thin layer for tribological applications, as superconductive material, in high temperature engineering systems, etc. In the frame of a systematic study of activation cross-sections of charged particle induced reactions on structural materials proton induced excitation functions on Nb targets were determined with the aim of applications in accelerator and reactor technology and for thin layer activation (TLA). The charged particle activation cross-sections on this element are also important for yield calculation of medical isotope production (^88,89Zr, ^86,87,88Y) and for dose estimation in PET targetry. As niobium is a monoisotopic element it is an ideal target material to test nuclear reaction theories. We present here the experimental excitation functions of ⁹³Nb(p,x)^90,93mMo, ^92m,91m,90Nb, ^88,89Zr and ⁸⁸Y in the energy range 0-37 MeV.The results were compared with the theoretical cross-sections calculated by means of the code ALICE-IPPE, EMPIRE-3, TALYS and with the literature data. The theory reproduces the shape of the measured results well and magnitude is also acceptable.Thick target yields calculated from our fitted cross-section give reliable estimations for production of medically relevant radioisotopes and for dose estimation in accelerator technology.