The half-life of the first metastable state in 90Nb

Abstract
A delayed γ activity, Eγ = 122.2 ± 0.2 keV, t1/2 = 18.82 ± 0.09 s, is observed following 10 MeV proton bombardment of targets of natural Zr and of natural Hf in which Zr is present as a contaminant. The present results taken together with other recently published data show that this activity arises from 90Zr(p,n)90Nbm. The tentative assignment of this 122 keV γ activity to 179Ta, which we proposed in an earlier publication, is withdrawn.