Weak interaction strengths for supernovae calculations via the (t,3He) reaction on medium-heavy nuclei

The Ni-58 (t, He-3)Co-58 reaction at 112 MeV/nucleon was measured to identify strength associated with Gamow-Teller transitions in the T-z = +1 direction. The experiment is a test case for future similar studies. The main aim of such studies is to test theoretical models used to predict Gamow-Teller strength distributions that serve as input for supernovae evolution calculations. The results indicate that the (t, He-3) reaction is indeed a powerful tool to perform such tests.