The 90° cross-section of the reaction
3
1
H(
d
,
n
)
4
2
He has been investigated over the energy range 100 to 200 keV (energy of bombarding triton) using the 200 keV accelerating set of the establishment. Two methods have been used. As a preliminary experiment the yield of alpha-particles from a thick heavy-ice target was measured per unit charge of incident beam, as a function of deuteron energy, and the variation of cross-section deduced from the gradient of this excitation curve and the range energy relation for tritons in heavy water. Secondly, a comparison was made between the yield of alpha-particles from the D-T reaction and the yield of protons from the D-D reaction when a beam containing both deuterons and tritons was passed through a heavy-water vapour target. (The energy loss in this target was calculated as only a few hundred electron volts.) To do this a simultaneous observation was made of the protons and alpha-particles using the same counter. The values obtained for the cross-section have been compared with the resonance formulae given by Bretscher & French (1949) and by Tascbek, Everhart, Gittings, Hemmendinger & Jarvis (1948) and have been found to be in disagreement with formulae of this type. From considerations of the absolute magnitude of the cross-section it has been deduced that no conventional theory postulating reaction at a distance equal to the sum of the nuclear radii (cf. Konopinski & Teller 1948) will be able to explain this reaction. The evidence for a low-energy resonance (Allan & Poole 1949) is thought to be inconclusive.
