Single- and multi-foils $^{27}$ Al(p,3pn) $^{24}$ Na activation technique for monitoring the intensity of high-energy beams

This paper discusses an experimental study of the spallation reaction $^{27}$ Al(p,3pn) $^{24}$Na in Al foils exposed to 24 $GeV c^{−1}$ protons, in the context of monitoring the intensity of multi-GeV proton beams through foil activation techniques. Since this reaction is sensitive to secondary neutrons and other energetic secondary hadrons, it is important to evaluate the impact of the foil thickness on the calculation of the beam intensity. This effect is determined experimentally using a stack of Al foils of varying thickness. The experimental results are then compared to Monte Carlo simulations.