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Since neutrons are uncharged, exceptionally hard to control, my understanding is that particle accelerators can never directly produce a beam of neutrons. Instead, they need to accelerate some charged particle (AFAIK ususally protons or deuterons) and create a focused beam, which is then shot at a target.

My question is: Is it possible to do this in such a way that the resulting neutrons are focused into a predictable, focused beam? Or is there always some degree of random scattering associated with this procedure? Is there another way?

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  • $\begingroup$ Related: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relativistic_aberration $\endgroup$
    – PM 2Ring
    Commented Dec 21, 2023 at 13:53
  • $\begingroup$ @PM2Ring thanks! I took a brief look at the article, and I'm not sure I quite get it. Does it mean that the neutron gun assembly needs to be moving at relativistic speeds in order to make the beam appear more concentrated? Or does the object the neutron beam is aimed need to be moving at relativistic speeds? $\endgroup$
    – Jake
    Commented Dec 21, 2023 at 20:51
  • $\begingroup$ The idea is to aim the protons (or deuterons) at a moving target so that the neutrons inherit the momentum of both the protons and the target. $\endgroup$
    – PM 2Ring
    Commented Dec 21, 2023 at 21:00
  • $\begingroup$ @PM2Ring Ah, that makes sense. However, it seems like the target of choice is generally a sheet of lithium beryllium, and I'm not sure how one would speed up such an object sufficiently...? Thanks for the quick response btw! $\endgroup$
    – Jake
    Commented Dec 21, 2023 at 21:05
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    $\begingroup$ It is not moving targets . here is where time of flight neutron beams are described. home.cern/science/experiments/n_tof $\endgroup$
    – anna v
    Commented Dec 22, 2023 at 4:55

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