“…The s-process production of 180 Ta depends on the neutron capture cross sections of 179 Ta [7] and 180 Ta [14,15,16] and the photodestruction of the 9 − isomeric state in 180 Ta which has been studied using real photons from bremsstrahlung and from radioactive sources and virtual photons in Coulomb excitation experiments [17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28,29,30]. It is the scope of the present paper to improve the analysis of the above experimental data and to calculate the effective half-life of 180 Ta under s-process conditions and the survival probability of 180 Ta in supernova explosions after production by photon-and neutrino-induced reactions.…”