beta decay of Cl-32: Precision gamma-ray spectroscopy and a measurement of isospin-symmetry breaking
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Background: Models to calculate small isospin-symmetry-breaking effects in superallowed Fermi decays have been placed under scrutiny in recent years. A stringent test of these models is to measure transitions for which the correction is predicted to be large. The decay of 32Cl decay provides such a test case.Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to improve the yields following the decay of 32Cl and to determine the ft values of the the branches, particularly the one to the isobaric-analog state in 32S.Method: Reaction-produced and recoil-spectrometer-separated 32Cl is collected in a tape and transported to a counting location where - coincidences are measured with a precisely calibrated high-purity germanium detector.Results: The precision on the yields for most of the known branches has been improved by about an order of magnitude, and many new transitions have been observed. We have determined 32Cl-decay transition strengths extending up to E x 11 MeV. The ft value for the decay to the isobaric-analog state in 32S has been measured. A comparison to a shell-model calculation shows good agreement.Conclusions: We have experimentally determined the isospin-symmetry-breaking correction to the superallowed transition of this decay to be ( C - NS )exp=5. 4(9)%, significantly larger than for any other known superallowed Fermi transition. This correction agrees with a shell-model calculation, which yields C - NS =4.8(5)%. Our results also provide a way to improve the measured ft values for the decay of 32Ar. 2012 American Physical Society.