Photonuclear reactions of actinides in the giant dipole resonance region

Photonuclear reactions at energies covering the giant dipole resonance (GDR) region are analyzed with an approach based on nuclear photoabsorption followed by the process of competition between light-particle evaporation and fission for the excited nucleus. The photoabsorption cross-section at energies covering the GDR region is contributed by both the Lorentz-type GDR cross-section and the quasi-deuteron cross-section. The evaporation-fission process of the compound nucleus is simulated in a Monte Carlo framework. Photofission reaction cross-sections are analyzed in a systematic manner in the energy range of ∼ 10-20 MeV for the actinides ²³²Th , ²³⁸U and ²³⁷Np . Photonuclear cross-sections for the medium-mass nuclei ⁶³Cu and ⁶⁴Zn , for which there are no fission events, are also presented. The study reproduces satisfactorily the available experimental data of photofission cross-sections at GDR energy region and the increasing trend of nuclear fissility with the fissility parameter Z ²/A for the actinides.     

Fusion-fission dynamics in the superheavy nucleus production

The fusion-fission reaction mechanism leading to the massive nucleus formation is studied. We investigate the superheavy nucleus formation in heavy-ion induced reactions by analysing the evaporation residue (ER) production in order to study the fusion dynamics and the decay properties of nuclei close to the stability island at Z=114. We consider the ⁶¹Ni+²⁰⁸Pb, ⁴⁸Ca+²³⁸U and ⁴⁸Ca+²⁴⁴Pu reactions that lead to the Z=110, 112 and 114 superheavy elements respectively. By using the dinuclear system (DNS) concept of the two interacting nuclei we calculate the quasifission-fusion competition in the entrance channel and the fission-evaporation competition along the de-excitation cascade of the compound nucleus. The dynamics of the entrance channel allows us to determine the beam energy window which is favorable to the fusion, while the dynamic evolution of the compound nucleus on the shell correction to the fission barrier and the dissipative effects influence the fission-evaporation competition in order to obtain the residue nuclei from the superheavy nucleus formation. We also calculate the τ _n /τ_tot ratio at each step of the de-excitation cascade of the compound nucleus and we present a systematics of τ _n /τ_tot (at first step of the cascade) for many reactions that lead to nuclei with Z=102–114.     

A systematic study of the fission and evaporation residue excitation functions in complete fusion reactions with weakly bound stable nuclei

We carry out a systematic study on the fusion-fission and evaporation residue excitation functions for the reactions of ^6,7Li, ⁹Be, ^10,11B + ²⁰⁹Bi and ^6,9Li, ⁹Be + ²⁰⁸Pb, in which the projectiles are loosely bound and have low threshold energies against breakup. The fusion cross sections are calculated by the coupled-channel model. The compound nuclei decay are analyzed with the standard statistical model. The fission and evaporation residue excitation functions are well reproduced by our calculations, proving the validity of the standard statistical model in describing the compound nuclei decay in these characteristic reactions. For the compound nuclei with A=215-220 and Z=86-88, the liquid drop fission barriers need to be scaled by 0.80-1.02 to reproduce the experimental data. And a decreasing trend of the scaling factor with increasing fissionability parameter Z²/(50A) is found.     

Light particle accompanied quasifission in superheavy composite systems

The dynamics of the excited superheavy system with Z = 118 in the reaction ⁸⁶Kr + ²⁰⁸Pb at E _Kr = 460, 500, and 600 MeV has been investigated. The mass and kinetic energy of binary fragments were measured by the time-of-flight method. Double-differential distributions of protons and α particles were measured in coincidence with fragments. The proton spectra can be described considering only evaporation from fragments. Evidence of the neck fragmentation was obtained from analysis of double-differential α spectra. Properties of the α-particle neck fragmentation component are close to those known from the ternary fission of actinide nuclei, but the multiplicity is much larger than can be expected from extrapolation of the ternary fission data. The text was submitted by the authors in English.     

Neutron-induced reaction rates for the <Emphasis Type="Italic">r</Emphasis>-process

Neutron-induced reaction rates for the formation of heavy and superheavy nuclei in the astrophysical r-process are presented. Neutron-induced reactions, including fission and neutron capture, at astrophysical temperatures are treated within the framework of the statistical model and calculated for targets with the atomic number 84 < Z < 118, using different mass and fission barrier predictions. The dependence of heavy element yields from nuclear explosions on the target nuclei, nuclear reactions, and nuclear models is discussed.     

Investigation of the role of the projectile-target orientation angles on the evaporation residue production

The measured yield of evaporation residues in reactions with massive nuclei have been well reproduced by using the partial fusion and quasifission cross sections obtained in the dinuclear-system model. The influence of the orientation angles of the projectile- and target-nucleus symmetry axes relative to the beam direction on the production of the evaporation residues is investigated for the ⁴⁸Ca + ¹⁵⁴Sm reaction as a function of the beam energy. At the low beam energies only the orientation angles close to αP = 30° (projectile) and αP = 0°–15° (target) can contribute to the formation of evaporation residues. At large beam energies (about E _c.m. = 140–180 MeV) the collisions at all values of orientation angles αP and α _T of reactants can contribute to the evaporation residue cross section which ranges between 10–100 mb, while at E _c.m. > 185 MeV the evaporation residue cross section ranges between 0.1–1 mb because the fission barrier for the compound nucleus decreases by increasing its excitation energy and angular momentum.     

Rate of excited-nucleus fission within a multidimensional stochastic approach

A stochastic approach to describing the dynamics of the nuclear-fission process is applied to study the effect of the number of dimensions on the fission rate within the dynamical model used. The time dependence of the fission rate is calculated on the basis of a multidimensional Langevin equation without taking into account particle evaporation. The one-, two-, and three-dimensional cases are considered for the example of the “c, h, α” parametrization of nuclear-surface shapes. The calculations are performed for a large number of compound nuclei whose parameter Z ²/A falls within the range 20 ≤ Z ²/A ≤ 40. The stationary level of the fission rate is found to increase considerably upon going over from the one- to the three-dimensional case. This increase is especially pronounced for light fissile nuclei in the vicinity of the Businaro-Gallone point. Also, the stationary fission-rate level obtained from our dynamical simulation is compared with its counterpart calculated by the Kramers formula generalized to the multidimensional case.     

Light charged particle emission and fission in238U+238U collisions at 1,740 MeV

Inclusive⁴He and⁴H energy spectra and heavy fragment coincidence correlations have been measured for reactions of 7.31 MeV/u²³⁸U with²³⁸U and^?197Au targets. The H/He production cross sections are in the range 15–26 mb, and their emission spectra are very similar for the two systems. The observed strong kinematic shifts with angle are reproduced in shape and magnitude by Monte Carlo simulations of particle evaporation from projectile-like and target-like fragments, indicating competition between charged particle emission and sequential fission. No evidence is found for high energy charged particle emission associated with ultra-highZ composite systems. Heavy fragment measurements indicate an abundance of quasielastic and deeply inelastic reaction fragments, as well as sequential fission of target and projectile nuclei. For²³⁸U nuclei, the fission occurs predominantly in an asymmetric mode, reminiscent of fission at low excitation energy. For²³⁸+²³⁸U reactions in the vicinity of the grazing angle, the frequency of single sequential fission (with survival of the partner fragment) is twice as large as double sequential fission in which both the target and projectile undergo fission. In²³⁸U+¹⁹⁷Au reactions, the survival probability of the heavy fragments is even greater. The surprisingly high survival probabilities of high-Z fragments imply a preponderance of very soft collisions in these very-heavy-ion reactions, at least at energies not very far over the Coulomb barrier.     

Time-of-flight measurement of the evaporation residues from fusion of 5.9 mev/u 84kr and 27al

Mass and Z-distributions of the evaporation residues from compound-nucleus formation in the reaction 5.9 MeV/u ⁸⁴Kr on ²⁷Al were measured using a time-of-flight ΔE ? E telescope, which is described in detail. The high recoil velocity attained by choosing the heavy reaction partner as projectile made it possible to resolve the reaction products by mass and atomic number. Data were taken in the angular range from 1.5 to 6°. The residue distributions are compared to evaporation calculations assuming the statistical decay by fission and particle evaporation of the compound nucleus ¹¹¹Mn formed at an excitation energy of 108 MeV with angular momenta up to $\text{L}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>CN</mtext>}}\text{≈ 69}\text{h}\text{?}$. The data are consistent with the assumption of statistical equilibrium. Details of the de-excitation process, in particular the fission competition and the influence of nuclear deformations at high angular momenta, are discussed.     

Dynamical decay process of <Superscript>219, 220</Superscript>Ra<Superscript>*</Superscript> formed in <Superscript>10, 11</Superscript>B + <Superscript>209</Superscript>Bi reactions

The excitation functions for both the evaporation residue and fission have been calculated for ¹⁰B + ²⁰⁹Bi and ¹¹B + ²⁰⁹Bi reactions forming compound systems ^{219, 220}Ra^* , using the dynamical cluster-decay model (DCM) with effects of deformations and orientations of the nuclei included in it. In addition to this, the excitation functions for complete fusion (CF) are obtained by summing the fission cross-sections, neutron evaporation and charged particle evaporation residue cross-sections produced through the axn\ensuremath \alpha xn and pxn\ensuremath pxn (x = 2, 3, 4) emission channels for the ²¹⁹Ra system at various incident centre-of-mass energies. Experimentally the CF cross-sections are suppressed and the observed suppression is attributed to the low binding energy of ^{10, 11}B which breaks up into charged fragments. The reported complete fusion (CF) and incomplete fusion (ICF) excitation functions for the ²¹⁹Ra system are found to be nicely fitted by the calculations performed in the framework of DCM, without invoking a significant contribution from quasi-fission. Although DCM has been applied for a number of compound nucleus decay studies in the recent past, the same is being used here in reference to ICF and subsequent decay processes along with the CF process. Interestingly the main contribution to complete fusion cross-section comes from the fission cross-section at higher incident energies, which in DCM is found to consist of an asymmetric fission window, shown to arise due to the deformation and orientation effects of formation and decay fragments.     

Nuclear charge distribution of mass-separated isobars from thermal-neutron-induced fission of 235U

The nuclear charge distribution of fission products with mass numbers A = 90, 91, 94, 99, 100, 101 and 104 provided by the mass separator “Lohengrin” was measured. Adjacent elements in the group of the light fission products could be separated by their different energy loss in a carbon absorber. The Z-yields were found to be strongly dependent on the kinetic energy of the fission products. The widths of the nuclear charge distributions are very small, in general, and strongly dependent on A as well as on the kinetic energy. The influence of the neutron evaporation and odd-even effects are clearly detected. An asymmetric nuclear charge distribution was found for A = 104 indicating the suppression of fission fragments with Z = 43. The average nuclear charges of the fission products at their average kinetic energy are in good agreement with the results from measurements of the number of β-decays and K X-ray measurements. The average nuclear charge of the isobar A = 132 was measured at its average kinetic energy with a calibrated secondary electron detector to be Z = 51.14 ± 0.15 which is in very good agreement with the radiochemical results. Thus previous physical measurements indicating a large independent yield for the doubly magic nucleus ¹³²Sn could not be confirmed.     

Fission-to-spallation ratio and fission dynamics manifestation

Fission of highly excited nuclei is affected by the viscous character of the system motion in deformation coordinates as is reported for very heavy nuclei with Z ⩾ 90. The long-time-scale fission was proved for such systems formed in heavy-ion-induced reactions. The overdamped diabatic motion may influence also fission of the spallation-residue products in reactions with protons at intermediate energy. In the present work, the experimental results on fission-to-spallation ratio are analyzed and the evidences for the long-time-scale fission are found in the fission excitation functions for medium-mass targets with Z = 70–75. The text was submitted by the authors in English.     

Energy dependence of Lévy stability and multi-fractal spectrum in e<Superscript>+</Superscript>e<Superscript>−</Superscript> collisions

Various nuclear reactions like quasi-fission, fusion-fission or particle and cluster evaporation from excited compound nuclei were studied in heavy-ion reactions at the velocity filter SHIP of GSI. The velocity filter offers the possibility to detect all reaction products under zero degree relative to the beam direction. Together with the measurement of the product velocity distribution this allows for an identification of the underlying reaction mechanism. This article is focussed on reactions of ²⁵Mg and ⁶⁴Ni beams on ^{206, 207}Pb targets at energies of 5.9×AMeV and 8.7×AMeV . Besides evaporation residues from ²⁵Mg + ²⁰⁶Pb collisions we found evidence for rotation and quasi-fission of nuclear molecules formed in the entrance channel after the capture stage. The break-up of the systems showed a preferred clustering leading to isotopes in the region 84 ⩽ Z ⩽ 88 and 122 ⩽ N ⩽ 127 of the chart of nuclei.     

Fragment dependence of high energy γ-ray emission in the spontaneous fission of 252Cf

The high energy γ-ray emission accompanying the spontaneous fission of ²⁵²Cf has been measured in coincidence with individual fission fragments selected by discrete γ-ray transitions. The enhancement of the γ-ray emission probability in the energy range E_γ= 3–8 MeV has been observed for the fission fragments in the region of nearly symmetric mass splitting, confirming results reported in previous investigations. The γ-γ coincidence technique employed in the present work clearly demonstrate that the major contribution to this enhancement is caused by the fission channels where one fragment is near to the N= 82 or Z= 50 shell closures. The high energy γ-ray emission probability does not show any significant dependence on the number of neutrons emitted in the fission process, supporting the hypothesis that high energy γ-rays are mainly emitted from the fragments after the neutron evaporation. Received: 22 December 1998     

Fusion-fission of heavy and superheavy nuclei

The process of fusion-fission of heavy and superheavy nuclei (SHE) with Z=82–122 formed in the reactions with ⁴⁸Ca and ⁵⁸Fe ions at energies near and below the Coulomb barrier has been studied. The experiments were carried out at the U-400 accelerator of the Flerov Laboratory of Nuclear Reactions (JINR) and at the XTU Tandem accelerator of the National Laboratory of Legnaro (LNL) using the time-of-flight spectrometer of fission fragments CORSET and the neutron multidetector DEMON. As a result of the experiments, mass and energy distributions (MED) of fission fragments; fission, quasifission, and evaporation residue cross sections; and multiplicities of neutrons and γ-quanta and their dependences on the mechanism of formation and decay of compound systems have been studied.     

Energy Dependence of the Most Stable Nuclei Production in Proton-Induced 238U and 232Th Fission

Using the available experimental data, production cross sections of the most stable nuclei have been calculated for the proton-induced fission of ²³⁸U and ²³²Th at 12, 20, 35, 50, 96 MeV in case of ²³⁸U and at 8, 9.3, 12, 19.55, 32.2, 44.7, 53 MeV for ²³²Th. The analysis has been carried out for the fission fragment mass ranges corresponding to N/Z ratios in the ranges 1.33 ± 0.09 and 1.32 ± 0.08 for ²³⁸U and ²³²Th respectively. Results have been compared with the ones generated indirectly by employing GEF nuclear reaction code, version 2017/1.1. From the production cross sections point of view, for the same energy, ²³²Th is found to be a better target than ²³⁸U for producing nuclei A around the symmetric mass peak, while ²³⁸U comes out to be a better one than ²³²Th for producing the fission fragments around the asymmetric peaks of the mass distribution.

     

Non-axial shapes in spontaneous fission of superheavy nuclei

We test the importance of non-axial nuclear shapes in spontaneous fission of heavy and superheavy even-even nuclei from the region around a hypothetical doubly magic nucleus ²⁹⁸114. Fission half-lives are calculated by finding dynamical fission paths as dictated by the least WKB action principle with the macroscopic-microscopic energy and the cranking inertial parameters. Results show that the effects of non-axial shapes on the fission process are weakened by the inertia tensor and become important only for the heaviest elements with Z ⩾ 120.     

<Emphasis Type="Italic">T</Emphasis>-odd asymmetries for evaporation γ-rays in nuclear fission

T-odd asymmetries in angular distributions of evaporation γ-rays emitted by thermalized fragments resulting from the fission of axially symmetric deformed nuclei induced by cold polarized neutrons are investigated within the quantum theory of fission. The asymmetries in question are due to the anisotropy of the angular distributions of evaporation γ-rays, caused by zero wriggling vibrations of the fissioning nucleus and associated with the orientation of large fission fragment spins in the direction perpendicular to the direction n ₀ of the symmetry axis of the fissioning nucleus at the time of its separation into fragments. The angle of rotation of the vector n ₀ with respect to the asymptotic direction of the light fission fragment emission is calculated with allowance for the interference of fission amplitudes of neutron resonances excited in the fissioning nucleus as it captures the incident neutron. It is shown that the angular and energy characteristics of the T-odd asymmetry calculated for evaporation γ-rays agree with the characteristics of the experimentally investigated T-odd asymmetry in angular distributions of all γ-rays emitted by a fissioning ²³⁶U nucleus.     

Isospin aspects in nuclear reactions involving Ca beams at 25 MeV/nucleon

Isospin dependence of dynamical and thermodynamical properties observed in reactions ⁴⁰Ca+ ^40,48Ca and ⁴⁰Ca + ⁴⁶Ti at 25 MeV/nucleon has been studied. We used the CHIMERA multi-detector array. Strong isospin effects are seen in the isotopic distributions of light nuclei and in the competition between different reaction mechanisms in semi-central collisions. We will show also preliminary results obtained in nuclear collision ⁴⁸Ca + ⁴⁸Ca at 25MeV/nucleon, having very high N/Z value in the entrance channel (N/Z = 1.4). The enhancement of evaporation residue production confirms the strong role played by the N/Z degree of freedom in nuclear dynamics.     

The reaction238U +238U at 7.42MeV/u

One-particle-inclusive measurements have been performed for the charge, kinetic energy and angular distributions of reaction products from²³⁸U +²³⁸U at 1 766MeV (7.42MeV/u) incident energy. The deep inelastic products exhibit features similar to those seen in reactions induced by medium heavy nuclei: increasing particle transfer is observed with increasing energy damping, the angular distributions are peaked near the grazing angle, they broaden significantly with increasing energy loss and/or charge transfer. The dominant reaction mechanism, however, is found to be sequential fission of one or both primary reaction products. The reconstructed primaryZ- andQ-value distributions show more particle transfer at a given energy loss than in other systems, i.e. the diffusion process seems to proceed colder in this system. This is confirmed by relatively large cross sections for surviving deep inelastic reaction products belowZ=92. A direct search forα-decay or fission of superheavy nuclei being produced in a deep inelastic reaction and being implanted in a surface barrier detector resulted in an upper cross section limit of 2 ×10^?32cm².