First observation of low-energy γ-ray enhancement in the rare-earth region

Here, the γ-ray strength function and level density in the quasi-continuum of 151,153Sm have been measured using bismuth germanate shielded Ge clover detectors of the STARLiTeR system. The Compton shields allow an extraction of the γ strength down to unprecedentedly low γ energies of ≈ 500 keV. For the first time an enhanced low-energy γ-ray strength has been observed in the rare-earth region. In addition, for the first time both the upbend and the well-known scissors resonance have been observed simultaneously for the same nucleus. Hauser-Feshbach calculations show that this strength enhancement at low γ energies could have an impact of 2 3 orders of magnitude on the (n, γ) reaction rates for r-process nucleosynthesis.