Search for an 80 ms spontaneous fission activity in bombardments of 249Bk with 15N

A rotating drum system was used to search for an 80 ms spontaneous fission (sf) activity in the reaction of ¹⁵N with ²⁴⁹Bk. No such activity was found beyond a cross section limit of 0.5 nb. A sf activity with a half-life of 23 ± 2 ms and a maximum formation cross section of 19 ± 4 nb at 82 MeV was observed. The identity of this activity has not been determined.     

Coherence and self-induced transparency in high-energy hadronic collisions

Two consequences of coherence of mesonic fields have been tested in proton-nucleus collisions. Multiplicity fluctuations measured in finite rapidity intervals are found to obey a Poisson distribution at large rapidities where nuclear transparency occurs. In close analogy to quantum optics we present a quark-parton model in which this link between coherence and transparency is realized via the phenomenon of self-induced transparency.     

A measurement of direct photon production at large pT at the CERN ISR

We have measured direct photon production in pp collisions at the CERN intersecting storage rings for c.m. energies 31 < √s < 63 GeV and transverse momenta up to 9GeV/c, using segmented lead/liquid-argon calorimeters. The ratio of direct photon to π⁰ production is significantly larger than zero, starting at p_T ≈ 4 GeV/c and increasing to values of about 0.4 at 9GeV/c. No significant √s dependence is seen.     

Steepest-descent failure analysis

An extensive failure analysis of the steepest-descent optimization algorithm has been made. Each of the ways in which the algorithm can fail is discussed in terms of both the mathematical and numerical manifestations of a failure and the information which each type of failure provides about the formulation of the physical problem. Numerical tests for each of the various types of failure are described; several faulty problem formulations are presented, each of which illustrates a particular type of failure. A table is presented in which all failure modes are summarized and the corresponding numerical tests are exhibited.     

A possible dependence of recombination of magnetic field

It is suggested that recent beam experiments which were designed to disprove Bohm diffusion may instead have revealed the existence of unsuspected magnetic effects upon recombination.