Ground-state proton decay of 69Br and implications for the 68Se astrophysical rapid proton-capture process waiting point.

We report on the first direct measurement of the proton separation energy for the proton-unbound nucleus (69)Br. Bypassing the (68)Se waiting point in the rp process is directly related to the 2p-capture rate through (69)Br, which depends exponentially on the proton separation energy. We find a proton separation energy for (69)Br of Sp((69)Br )= -785(-40)(+34) keV; this is less bound compared to previous predictions which have relied on uncertain theoretical calculations. The influence of the extracted proton separation energy on the rp process occurring in type I x-ray bursts is examined within the context of a one-zone burst model.