Experimental extraction of neutron resonance parameters at 0.1–300 eV for Yb168

The ($n,\ensuremath{\gamma}$) cross section of the nuclide $^{168}\mathrm{Yb}$, which is one of 35 $p$-nuclei, plays an important role in nuclear astrophysics network calculations. The $^{168}\mathrm{Yb}$ resonance parameters, ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{\ensuremath{\gamma}}$ and ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{n}$, show significant discrepancies between these evaluated nuclear data libraries, while existing experimental data remain insufficient to resolve them. In this study, the ($n,\ensuremath{\gamma}$) yield of $^{\mathrm{nat}}\mathrm{Yb}$ is measured at the Back-n facility of the Chinese Spallation Neutron Source using the time-of-flight method. The ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{\ensuremath{\gamma}}$ and ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{n}$ parameters of $^{168}\mathrm{Yb}$ are extracted by the multilevel $R$-matrix Bayesian code sammywithin the energy range of 0.1--300 eV. Both the ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{\ensuremath{\gamma}}$ and ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{n}$ parameters at three resonance peaks of 0.58, 22.53, and 27.17 eV are obtained successfully. Among them, the ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{\ensuremath{\gamma}}$ value at 27.17 eV is experimentally extracted to be 65.88 $\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}$ 5.80 meV for the first time. These resonance results are further compared with the available evaluated and experimental data. It is found that the extracted ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{\ensuremath{\gamma}}$ values are in good agreement with the nuclear data libraries ENDF/B-VIII.0, JENDL-4.0, BROND-3.1, and JEFF-3.3. Meanwhile, the extracted ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{n}$ value at 0.58 eV is consistent with TENDL-2019, whereas the ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}}_{n}$ values at two other resonance peaks are different from the existing data. These findings enrich the experimental data of the $^{168}\mathrm{Yb}$ neutron capture resonance and emphasize the importance of selecting appropriate nuclear data libraries.