International audienceThe β− decay of 63Mn to 63Fe has been studied in an experiment at ISOLDE, CERN. The previously known 63Fe level scheme has been confirmed and greatly expanded, to a total of 31 levels and 73 γ lines. The energy of the 9/2+ isomer state has been measured for the first time at 475.0 keV, completing the systematics of such states in odd-Fe isotopes below 68Ni. In addition, the lifetimes of the low-lying states have been measured, allowing the tentative assignment of the spin-parity sequence for those levels

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Total absorption gamma-ray spectroscopy is used to measure accurately the intensity of γ emission from neutron-unbound states populated in the β-decay of delayed-neutron emitters. From the comparison of this intensity with the intensity of neutron emission a constraint on the (n,γ) cross section for highly unstable neutron-rich nuclei can be deduced. A surprisingly large γ branching was observed for a number of isotopes which might indicate the need to increase by a large factor the Hauser-Feshbach (n,γ) cross-section estimates that impact on r process abundance calculations.

The neutron-rich nucleus 81 Ga was populated from the -decay of 81 Zn produced at the ISOLDE (CERN) facility. The analysis of -gated γ-ray singles and γ-γ coincidences permits to extend significantly the level scheme of 81 Ga as well as to provide a new half-life for 81 Zn. A preliminary upper limit was obtained for the half-life of the first excited state in 81 Ga.

In β-decay studies the determination of the decay probability to the ground state (g.s.) of the daughter nucleus often suffers from large systematic errors. The difficulty of the measurement is related to the absence of associated delayed γ -ray emission. In this work we revisit the 4πγ − β method proposed by Greenwood and collaborators in the 1990s, which has the potential to overcome some of the experimental difficulties. Our interest is driven by the need to determine accurately the β-intensity distributions of fission products that contribute significantly to the reactor decay heat and to the antineutrinos emitted by reactors. A number of such decays have large g.s. branches. The method is relevant for nuclear structure studies as well. Pertinent formulas are revised and extended to the special case of β-delayed neutron emitters, and the robustness of the method is demonstrated with synthetic data. We apply it to a number of measured decays that serve as test cases and discuss the features of the method. Finally, we obtain g.s. feeding intensities with reduced uncertainty for four relevant decays that will allow future improvements in antineutrino spectrum and decay heat calculations using the summation method.