Inelastic Neutron Scattering Studies of Uranium -238 and THORIUM-232 on States above 300 KEV for Incident Energies above 2.2 Mev.

Differential cross sections have been measured at incident energies from 2.3 to 3.0 MeV for vibrational states between 600 and 1000 keV in ^{232 } Th and ^{238}U, as well as for the 307.4 keV level in uranium and the 333.2 keV level in thorium which are members of ground state rotational band. Excitation functions for these levels have been obtained over the incident energy range 2.3-3.0 MeV in 100-keV steps. Angular distributions for these states were measured at 2.4 and 2.8 MeV. The data were obtained via the neutron time-of-flight technique using the University of Lowell 5.5 MV pulsed Van-de-Graaff accelerator with Mobley bunching system. Neutrons were generated via the ^7Li(p,n) ^7 Be reaction in a metalic lithium target having a thickness of 15-25 keV. Overall resolution of 25-30 keV was maintained throughout the measurements. The bunched pulse durations were less than 1 ns. Pulse shape discrimination (PSD) was employed to suppress gamma-ray background. Data reduction included, background, tail and fission subtraction; corrections were made for multiple scattering and for finite sample size effects. Studies were developed, employing a user interactive code to generate scattered neutron group response functions from the shape of elastic and inelastic scattering peaks obtained from measurements on elemental iron. The results are compared with theoretical calculations and previous measurements.