Towards a high-precision measurement of the 3He(α,γ)7Be cross section at LUNA

The 3He(4He,γ)7Be reaction is the key process for the production of 7Be and 8B neutrinos in the Sun. We have designed a new experimental setup to study this reaction with high accuracy at low energies using two different experimental techniques. The first method consists in measuring the prompt capture gamma-ray transitions with an ultra-low background germanium detector heavily shielded and placed at close distance from a 3He windowless gas target. With another fully shielded large-volume germanium detector we will also measure the β-decay of the 7Be residual nuclei. The aim of the experiment is to reduce the error on the astrophysical factor S3, 4 to 4%.