Dynamic nuclear polarization of irradiated targets

Polarized proton targets used in high energy physics experiments employ the method of dynamic nuclear polarization (DNP) to polarize the protons in an alcohol. DNP requires the presence of paramagnetic centers, which are customarily provided by a chemical dopant. These targets suffer from loss of polarization as the target is irradiated, and also the hydrogen fraction for the alcohols is relatively low, e.g., 0.13 for butanol. If the paramagnetic centers formed when the target is irradiated could be used in the DNP process, the resulting targets might be more radiation-resistant. Also it might be possible to use materials which have high hydrogen fractions, but are not easily doped, such as NH3 or HD.