Peripheral elastic and inelastic scattering of 17,18O on light targets at 12 MeV/nucleon

A study of interaction of neutron-rich oxygen isotopes O-17,O-18 with light targets has been undertaken in order to determine the optical potentials needed for the transfer reaction C-13(O-17, O-18)C-12. Optical potentials in both incoming and outgoing channels have been determined in a single experiment. This transfer reaction was used to infer the direct capture rate to the F-17(p,gamma)Ne-18 which is essential to estimate the production of F-18 at stellar energies in ONe novae. The success of the asymptotic normalization coefficient (ANC) as indirect method for astrophysics is guaranteed if the reaction mechanism is peripheral and the distorted wave Born approximation cross-section calculations are warranted and stable against the optical model potential (OMP) used. We demonstrate the stability of the ANC method and the OMP results by using good-quality elastic and inelastic-scattering data with stable beams before extending the procedures to rare-ion beams. The peripherality of our reaction is inferred from a semiclassical decomposition of the total-scattering amplitude into barrier and internal barrier components. Comparison between elastic scattering of O-17, O-18, and O-16 projectiles is made.