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As part of the study of trace elemental analysis of ancient Indian coins, twenty-five coins belonging to medieval period (11th-14th century A.D.) and fifty-nine coins belonging to Kusanas (78-250 A.D.) from India have been analyzed using Proton Induced X-ray Emission (PIXE) technique. The elements S, Ca, Fe, Cu, Ag, Sn, Pb were detected in 14th-14th century A.D. coins while elements namely S, Cl, K, Ca, Ti, Cr, Mn, Fe, Ni, Cu. As and Zn were detected in most of the Kusanas coins. Based on the elemental analysis different hypotheses put forward in the earlier literature were examined. The presence of Pb determined in medieval period coins does not rule out the utilization of local source of silver extracted from argentiferous galena instead of the Faranial mines of Afghanistan as normally accepted. From the consistent concentration of Ag in these coins despite the change of Kingdoms, it is confirmed that beside the rulers the commercial communities had a great influence in the currency of medieval period. This is the first attempt where reasonable number of ancient coins belonging to different periods were analysed by modern non destructive multi-elemental technique such as PIXE and has put the importance of the elemental analysis of ancient Indian coins in the proper perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The first phase of the National Array of Neutron Detectors (NAND) consisting of 26 neutron detectors has been commissioned at the Inter University Accelerator Centre (IUAC), New Delhi. The motivation behind setting up of such a detector system is the need for more accurate and efficient study of reaction mechanisms in the projectile energy range of 5–8 MeV/n using heavy ion beams from a 15 UD Pelletron and an upgraded LINAC booster facility at IUAC. The above detector array can be used for inclusive as well as exclusive measurements of reaction products of which at least one product is a neutron. While inclusive measurements can be made using only the neutron detectors along with the time of flight technique and a pulsed beam, exclusive measurements can be performed by detecting neutrons in coincidence with charged particles and/or fission fragments detected with ancillary detectors. The array can also be used for neutron tagged gamma-ray spectroscopy in (HI, xn) reactions by detecting gamma-rays in coincidence with the neutrons in a compact geometrical configuration. The various features and the performance of the different aspects of the array are described in the present paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: L x-ray production cross sections have been measured for thin solid targets (∼50μg/cm2) of 57La, 58Ce, 60Nd and 62Sm for 35–60MeV C4+ and O5+ ions. There is an increase in these cross sections with the increasing projectile energy and the ratio of its atomic number to the atomic number of the target nucleus (Z 1/Z 2). The measured L x-ray production cross sections have been compared with the predicted values of the first Born approximation (FBA) and of the ECPSSR theory that accounts for the projectile energy loss and Coulomb deflection and the perturbed stationary-state and relativistic nature of the L-shell. For C4+ ions, there is a reasonable agreement with the ECPSSR predicted values for the higher Z elements (Nd and Sm), while for the lower Z elements (La and Ce), the FBA is in a better accord with the data. For O5+ ions, the FBA gives a better agreement for all the elements than the ECPSSR theory. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]