Fission and decay of excited nuclei

The statistical theory of the decay of excited nuclei including the competition between particle emission and fission is considered. Fission barriers are given by a phenomenological formula which is an analog of the known Cameron formula and approximates well experimental data on nuclei up to transuranic elements. The contribution of shell corrections and odd-even effects is discussed. The calculated ratios of evaporation and fission widths Γ_n/Γ_f agree with experiment even in the region of nuclei with Z > 90. The $\text{Γ}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>n</mtext>}}\text{Γ}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>f</mtext>}}$ values depend weakly on excitation energy for nuclei with Z ≈ 90, While in other regions this dependence proves rather strong. The last conclusion does not contradict known experimental data since in experiments one usually measures some effective value $\text{〈}\text{Γ}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>n</mtext>}}\text{Γ}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>f</mtext>}}\text{〉}$, which is only indirectly related to the real $\text{Γ}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>n</mtext>}}\text{Γ}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>f</mtext>}}$, values. It is shown that the calculated values of $\text{〈}\text{Γ}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>n</mtext>}}\text{Γ}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>f</mtext>}}\text{〉}$ depend on excitation energy either. The effects of angular momentum and uncertainty in the choice of level density parameter are discussed.