| The Tri-University Meson Facility (TRIUMF) located in Vancouver, Canada has an extensive nuclear astrophysics program which aims to study rates of key nuclear reactions that take place in explosive stellar environments. Many of these experiments involve short-lived isotopes, therefore methods involving the use of radioactive ion beams (RIBS) must be employed.; At present there are several experiments at TRIUMF-ISAC which require high intensity 15O (half-life = 122.2 s) and 14O (half-life = 70 s) radioactive ion beams for the measurement of the rates of reactions such as 15O(alpha,gamma)19Ne and 14O(alpha,p)17F, respectively. The facility has been unable to produce a high intensity radioactive oxygen beam using a high-energy (500 MeV) proton beam and spallation techniques.; The goal of the work presented in this thesis is to explore alternative methods for the production of such oxygen beams at ISAC using low energy proton or deuteron beams.; A number of proof-of-principle radiochemical experiments were conducted making use of resources readily available. First the 14N(d,n) 15O reaction was investigated as a source of 15O to test the various transfer efficiencies of both 15O-labelled water and carbon monoxide, as well as conversion efficiencies of the radiolabelled water to carbon monoxide. Further experiments were conducted to produce 14O via the 14N(p,n)14O nuclear reaction. The results of the 14N(p,n)14O experiments can also be extrapolated in order to determine the projected RIB intensity that could be achieved using an enriched 15N gas target for the production of 15O via the 15N(p,n) reaction. |
