Version: 6.3

LUNA: a laboratory for underground nuclear astrophysics

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Author

H Costantini1, A Formicola2, G Imbriani3,4, M Junker2, C Rolfs5 and F Strieder5

Affiliations

1 INFN, Genova, Italy
2 INFN Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso, Assergi, Italy
3 Dipartimento di Scienze Fisiche, Universitá Federico II, Napoli, Italy
4 INFN, Napoli, Italy
5 Fakultät für Physik und Astronomie, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Germany

E-mail

costant@ge.infn.it formicola@lngs.infn.it imbriani@na.infn.it junker@lngs.infn.it rolfs@ep3.rub.de strieder@ep3.rub.de

Journal

Reports on Progress in Physics Create an alert RSS this journal

Issue

Volume 72, Number 8

Citation

H Costantini et al 2009 Rep. Prog. Phys. 72 086301

doi: 10.1088/0034-4885/72/8/086301


 
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Abstract

It is in the nature of astrophysics that many of the processes and objects one tries to understand are physically inaccessible. Thus, it is important that those aspects that can be studied in the laboratory are rather well understood. One such aspect is the nuclear fusion reactions, which are at the heart of nuclear astrophysics. They sensitively influence the nucleosynthesis of the elements in the earliest stages of the universe and in all the objects formed thereafter, and control the associated energy generation, neutrino luminosity and evolution of stars. We review a new experimental approach for the study of nuclear fusion reactions based on an underground accelerator laboratory, named LUNA.

PACS

98.80.Ft Origin, formation, and abundances of the elements

95.30.Cq Elementary particle processes

25.60.Pj Fusion reactions

97.10.Cv Stellar structure, interiors, evolution, nucleosynthesis, ages

Subjects

Nuclear physics

Gravitation and cosmology

Particle physics and field theory

Astrophysics and astroparticles

Dates

Issue 8 (August 2009)

Received 4 November 2008 , in final form 24 April 2009

Published 28 July 2009



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