Neutron capture cross sections from surrogate reaction data and theory: connecting the pieces with a Markov-Chain Monte Carlo approach

Abstract

The neutron capture cross section for $^{90}Zr(n, \gamma)$ has recently been determined using surrogate $^{92}Zr(p, d\gamma)$ data and nuclear reaction theory. That work employed an approximate fitting method based on Bayesian Monte Carlo sampling to determine parameters needed for calculating the $^{90}Zr(n, \gamma)$ cross section. Here, we improve the approach by introducing a more sophisticated Markov Chain Monte Carlo sampling method. We present preliminary results.