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Cautionary Notes on Cosmogenic W-182 and Other Nuclei in Lunar SamplesLeya et al. (2000) showed that neutron capture on Ta-181 results in a production rate of Ta-182 (decays with a half-life of 114 days to W-182) sufficiently high to cause significant shifts in W-182 abundances considering the neutron fluences due to the cosmic ray cascade that were known to occur near the lunar surface. Leya et al. concluded that this cosmogenic production of W-182 may explain the large positive epsilon(sub W-182) values that Lee et al. (1997) had reported in some lunar samples rather than being produced from decay of now extinct Hf-182 (bar tau = 13 x 10(exp 6) yr). If the large range in epsilon(sub W-182) of lunar samples (0 to +11 in whole rock samples) was due to decay of now extinct Hf-182, it would require a very early time of formation and differentiation of the lunar crust-mantle system (with high Hf/W ratios) during the earliest stages of Earth s accretion. This result was both surprising and difficult to understand. The ability to explain these results by a more plausible mechanism is therefore very attractive. In a recent report Lee et al. (2002) showed that there were excesses of W-182 and that epsilon(sub W-182) was correlated with the Ta/W ratios in the mineral phases of individual lunar rock samples. This is in accord with W-182 variations in lunar samples being produced by cosmic-ray induced neutron capture on Ta-182.
Document ID
20030111178
Acquisition Source
Headquarters
Document Type
Conference Paper
Authors
Yin, Qingzhu
(Harvard Univ. Cambridge, MA, United States)
Jacobsen, Stein B.
(Harvard Univ. Cambridge, MA, United States)
Wasserburg, G. J.
(Harvard Univ. Cambridge, MA, United States)
Date Acquired
August 21, 2013
Publication Date
January 1, 2003
Publication Information
Publication: Lunar and Planetary Science XXXIV
Subject Category
Lunar And Planetary Science And Exploration
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Public Use Permitted.
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