F. Pühlhofer

The kaon spectrometer at SIS

A double-focussing QD magnetic spectrometer has been developed and installed at the SIS heavy-ion facility at GSI in Darmstadt. The spectrometers primary purpose is to study meson production in energetic nucleus-nucleus collisions in detail. Its compact design is matched to the requirements of kaon detection with short flight path (5–6.5 m), large solid angle (up to 35 msr), wide momentum acceptance (pmaxpmin ⋍ 2), maximum momentum 1.6 GeV/c (1.9 GeV/c at reduced solid angle) and reasonable momentum resolution (⋍ 1% without and ⋍ 10−3 with ray tracing). A focal-plane length of about 1.5 m allows the efficient use of the detectors necessary for particle identification and ray-tracing, involving wire chambers, time-of-flight scintillators and Cherenkov detectors. Collisions can be characterized by two multiple-module plastic-scintillator hodoscopes detecting reaction fragments in the forward hemisphere. While the primary purpose for the construction of the spectrometer is the measurement of kaons, it can serve as a general purpose magnetic spectrometer. Its large solid angle also allows the study of two-particle correlations.

Enhanced out-of-plane emission of K+ mesons observed in Au + Au collisions at 1-A/GeV

The azimuthal angular distribution of K+ mesons has been measured in Au + Au collisions at 1 AGeV. In peripheral and semi-central collisions, K+ mesons preferentially are emitted perpendicular to the reaction plane. The strength of the azimuthal anisotropy of K+ emission is comparable to the one of pions. No in-plane flow was found for K+ mesons near projectile and target rapidity.

The reaction mechanism in the system132Xe+56Fe at 5.73 MeV/u: Evidence for a new type of strongly damped collisions

We present data for the132Xe+56Fe-system at 5.73 MeV/u laboratory energy. Due to inverted kinematics, where Xe is the projectile, we were able to measure energy spectra as well as angular distributions for reaction products with 20≦Z≦60 with unitZ-resolution; i.e. target- and projectile-like fragments have been investigated. The reaction shows a well focussed quasielastic component, where charge transfer from the light to the heavy collision partner dominates. This apparent tendency towards more asymmetric fragmentation is explained by a potential energy surface which favours such charge transfer in order to minimize the asymmetry energy of the liquid drop. The strongly damped component which constitutes the major part of the reaction cross section exhibits characteristics of a fusion-fission reaction with typical fission fragment kinetic energies and 1/sinΘc.m. angular distributions.The maximum cross section is found for the symmetric fragmentation, no clear indication is observed for a diffusion process leading to target- and projectile-like fragments. Our data are difficult to reconcile either with the standard diffusion models or with an equilibrated compound nucleus fission picture. We tentatively conclude that an essential part of the fully damped cross section originates from partial waves for which the compound nucleus has no fission barrier.

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

Abstract Mass and Z -distributions of the evaporation residues from compound-nucleus formation in the reaction 5.9 MeV/u 84 Kr on 27 Al 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 111 Mn formed at an excitation energy of 108 MeV with angular momenta up to L CN ≈ 69 h . 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.

Properties of high-energy pions emitted from heavy-ion collisions at 1 GeV/nucleon

Positively charged pions and protons from collisions of Ne+NaF and Au+Au at 1 GeV/nucleon incident energy were measured near midrapidity. The center-of-mass pion spectra deviate from a Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution. The slope of the high-energy part of the pion spectra varies significantly with the system mass and little with the size of the reaction zone. While the total pion yield rises linearly with the number of participant nucleons, the highenergy component increases more than linearly.

Kaon production in heavy ion collisions and the nuclear equation of state

Abstract Double differential cross sections for protons, π + and K + are measured in Au + Au collisions at 1.0 GeV/u and Θ lab =44°±4° with a new magnetic spectrometer at SIS. The pion spectra show an enhancement at low momenta with respect to a thermal distribution and little dependence on the collision centrality. The high-energetic pions measured in semi-central collisions at approximately midrapidity exhibit an anisotropic azimuthal angular distribution, peaking at 90° and 270° with respect to the reaction plane. The same feature is observed for protons. The kaon to proton ratio increases with the number of participating nucleons, i.e. with the centrality of the collision, whereas the pion to proton ratio stays constant. The first data on subthreshold K + production in a heavy mass collision system are discussed with respect to nuclear matter properties by a comparison to microscopic transport calculations.

A fast-fission component with small mass drift in the reaction84Kr+27Al atElab=5.9 MeV/u

All reaction products in the range from target- and projectile-like to fission-like fragments were measured for the system84Kr+27Al at 5.9 MeV/u beam energy. They are assigned to the various reaction mechanisms on the basis of experimental signatures (energy dissipation, mass and angular distribution). The sum of the measured partial cross sections, including the evaporation residue yield obtained previously, agrees with the total reaction cross section derived from elastic scattering. A small fast-fission component was found, discernible from deep-inelastic reactions by its 1/sin θ angular distribution, and distinguished from compound-nucleus fission by an incomplete mass asymmetry relaxation.

A study of the influence of shell effects in nuclear level densities on the decay of the compound nucleus58Ni

Mass andZ-distributions of fusion products from the reaction 5.8 MeV/u46Ti+12C were measured in the angular range betweenθlab=1.5° and 8° using a time-of-flightΔE−E telescope. The results are compared with an earlier measurement of the reaction32S+26Mg, in which the same compound nucleus was produced at higher excitation energy. The residual nuclide distributions are interpreted with the aid of evaporation calculations and the influence of shell effects in the level densities is discussed. The data are consistent with the assumption that the shell effects vanish above 15 to 20 MeV excitation energy, that is, that they are essentially only important for the last evaporation step.

Interfering transfer processes in heavy-ion reactions

Abstract Heavy-ion reactions in which two different transfer processes may interfere are analyzed. Angular distributions of the reactions 14 C( 16 O, 17 O) 13 C and 14 C( 16 O, 18 O) 12 C were measured at incident energies of 20, 25 and 30 MeV. The strong oscillations observed at the Coulomb barrier together with a backward rise at higher energies are taken as evidence for the superposition of two competing transfer reactions. DWBA calculations for the two single transfer processes were performed using the fixed-range approximation, and the two transition amplitudes were summed coherently. The experimental angular distributions are well reproduced. The DWBA also explains the disappearance of the interference structures for higher transferred angular momenta l . Data on the reaction 11 B( 16 O, 15 N) 12 C measured earlier are included in the analysis in order to show the systematic dependence on l -values.

Subthreshold kaon production in Au on Au collisions at 1 GeV/u

Subthreshold kaon production in197Au+197Au collisions at 1.0 GeV/u has been investigated with the Kaon Spectrometer at SIS. At Θlab=44±4∘ we found aK+/p ratio of>3 · 10−4 for the momentum range 650 MeV/c to 1150 MeV/c.