Updating the nuclear reaction rate library REACLIB. (I. Experimental reaction rates of the proton-proton chain)

Abstract

REACLIB is one of the most comprehensive and popular astrophysical reaction rate libraries. However, its experimentally obtained rates for light isotopes still rely mainly on the Caughlan & Fowler (1988) compilation and have never been updated despite the progress in many relevant nuclear astrophysics experiments. Moreover, due to fitting errors REACLIB is not reliable at temperatures lower than 10^{7}K. In this work we establish the formalism for updating the obsolete Caughlan-Fowler experimental rates of REACLIB. Then we use the NACRE compilation and results from the LUNA experiments to update some important charged-particle induced rates of REACLIB focusing on the proton-proton chain. The updated rates (available also in digital form) can now be used in the low temperature regime (below 10^{7}K) which was forbidden to the old version of REACLIB.