Medium-spin levels and the character of the 20.4 ns 132+ isomer in 145Gd

Levels of the N = 81 nucleus ¹⁴⁵Gd have been investigated by in-beam γ-ray and conversion electron spectroscopy with the ¹⁴⁴Sm(³He, 2n) reaction. Fourteen new low- and medium-spin states between 1.0 and 2.4 MeV excitation, the known yrast levels up to spin $\text{21}\text{2}{}^{\mathrm{+}}$, five other high-spin non-yrast states and a new 20.4 ns $\text{13}\text{2}$ isomer at 2200.2 keV in ¹⁴⁵Gd have been observed. The isomer decays via a fast 927.3 keV E3 transition with B(E3) = 48 ± 7 W.u. Another weaker decay branch is a mixed, strongly hindered E1 + M2 + E3 transition to the $\text{v}\text{h}{}^{\mathrm{?1}}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>11</mtext><mtext>2</mtext>}}$ state. We propose an octupole $\text{v}\text{f}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>7</mtext><mtext>2</mtext>}}\text{j}{}^{\mathrm{?2}}\text{× 3}{}^{\mathrm{?}}$ main configuration for the isomer, analogous to the 997 keV $\text{13}\text{2}{}^{\mathrm{+}}$ isomer in ¹⁴⁷Gd. The levels of ¹⁴⁵Gd are discussed on the basis of the spherical shell model.