G. N. Knyazheva

The CORSET time-of-flight spectrometer for measuring binary products of nuclear reactions

The CORSET time-of-flight spectrometer has been developed at the Flerov Laboratory of Nuclear Reactions of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (Dubna, Russia) for investigating binary products of nuclear reactions. The spectrometer has been used to study the dynamics of fusion-fission and quasi-fission of superheavy elements. The design and the main characteristics of the spectrometer, as well as the algorithms for deducing the mass-energy distributions of fragments and the cross sections of nuclear reactions, are presented. The spectrometer contains two time-of-flight arms based on microchannel-plate detectors and three telescopes, each of which is composed of two microchannel-plate detectors and one semiconductor detector. A system of four semiconductor detectors is used to obtain the absolute value of a cross section. The time resolution of the time-of-flight arms is 150 ps, which allows the time-of-flight distances to be set at 10–20 cm, thus providing a mass resolution of 3 amu and an angular resolution of 0.3°. Owing to these characteristics, the spectrometer can be used as a trigger in multidetector setups for measuring light charged particles, neutrons, and γ rays in coincidence with reaction fragments.

The influence of the entrance channel on the formation and decay of the compound nucleus 250No

The mass-energy and angular distributions of binary fissionlike fragments produced in the reactions 44Ca + 206Pb and 64Ni + 186W, leading to the same compound nucleus 250No, have been measured at excitation energies of 30 and 40 MeV. The presence of the quasifission component was observed for both systems. But in the case of the 64Ni ion, the quasifission process dominates, while in the case of the 44Ca ion, the main process is the fusion-fission of compound nucleus 250No. From the angular distributions of reaction fragments, the time scales were found for quasifission and fusion-fission for both reactions.

The Peculiarities of the Production and Decay of Superheavy Nuclei

The interest in the study of the fission process of superheavy nuclei mainly deals with the opportunity to obtain information about the cross‐section of the compound nucleus (CN) formation at excitation energies E*≈15–30 MeV. It allows one to estimate the survival probability of the superheavy composite system after evaporation of 1–3 neutrons, i.e. in “cold” or “warm” fusion reactions. However, in order to solve this problem deeper understanding of the coalescence processes between colliding nuclei, the competition between fusion‐fission and quasi‐fission processes is needed. The characteristics of both processes, their manifestation in the experimental observables and the relative contribution to the capture cross‐section in dependence on the excitation energies, reaction entrance channel etc were investigated for a wide range of target‐projectile combinations. Results of the experiments devoted to the study of the fusion‐fission and quasi‐fission processes in the reactions of the formation of the super...

Fission dynamics in the proton induced fission of actinide nuclei at intermediate energies

A multi‐parameter correlation study of the reactions 232Th(p,f), 238U(p,f) and 242Pu(p,f) at Ep=13, 20, 40 and 55 MeV has been conducted. The fission fragment mass, total kinetic energy distributions, double differential neutron spectra and γ‐ray spectra have been measured. The three humped shape of mass distributions has been observed up to higher proton energy. Pre‐equilibrium, pre‐scission and post‐scission neutron and γ‐ray multiplicities measured in coincidence with primary fission fragments provided access to fission dynamics. Shell structure effects were observed in fission fragment mass distributions even at high excitation energy. Manifestation of the nuclear shell Z = 28 near fragment mass Afr = 78 has been detected.

The time scale of quasifission process in reactions with heavy ions

The study of mass-energy distributions of binary fragments obtained in the reactions of 36S, 48Ca, 58Fe and 64Ni ions with the 232Th, 238U, 244Pu and 248Cm at energies below and above the Coulomb barrier is presented. These data have been measured by two time-of-flight CORSET spectrometer. The mass resolution of the spectrometer for these measurements was about 3u. It allows to investigate the features of mass distributions with good accuracy. The properties of mass and TKE of QF fragments in dependence on interaction energy have been investigated and compared with characteristics of the fusion-fission process. To describe the quasifission mass distribution the simple method has been proposed. This method is based on the driving potential of the system and time dependent mass drift. This procedure allows to estimate QF time scale from the measured mass distributions. It has been found that the QF time exponentially decreases when the reaction Coulomb factor Z1Z2 increases.

Fission dynamics In 132Ce composite nuclei at Ex = 122 MeV

We are carrying out a research program with the 8πLP apparatus at the Laboratori Nazionali di Legnaro (Italy), aimed at studying fission dynamics in systems of intermediate fissility. These systems, compared to the heavier ones, are characterized by larger pre‐scission charged particle multiplicities as well as by comparable fission and evaporation residue cross sections. Therefore, the measurement of observables in both channels allows putting severe constraints on the models, in order to obtain more reliable information on the dynamics of the process. We present the results for the composite system 122Ce, produced at Ex = 122 MeV in 200 MeV 32S+100Mo reaction. The comparison of the data with the predictions of a dynamical model, based on 3‐D Langevin equations, indicates that full one‐body dissipation plays a dominant role in the fission process, with a viscosity parameter independent from the temperature and a fission delay of ∼25*10−21 s.

Statistics vs. dynamics in fission: light and shade from systems of intermediate fissility

Systems of intermediate fissility are characterized by an evaporation residues cross section comparable or larger than the fission cross section, and by a relatively higher probability for charged particle emission in the pre‐scission channel. In a theoretical framework in which time scale estimates of the fission process rely on statistical model calculations, the analysis of particle emission in the evaporation residues channel is the source of additional constraints on the statistical and dynamical models. This contribution will focus on our statistical and dynamical analysis of a more complete set of data from the system 32S+100Mo at ELab = 200 MeV. Statistical model fails in reproducing the whole set of data and no convincing estimate is possible of the fission time scale. In particular, while pre‐scission multiplicities can be reproduced without delay, the model strongly overestimates proton and alpha particle multiplicities in the evaporation residues channel irrespective of the statistical model i...

Production of n-rich Nuclei along the Closed Shell N=126 in the collision 136Xe + 208Pb @E lab =870 MeV

Multi-nucleon transfer reactions are nowadays the only known mean to produce neutron-rich nuclei in the Terra Incognita. The closed-shell region N=126 is crucial for both studying shell-quenching in exotic nuclei and the r-process, being its last ”waiting-point”. The choice of suitable reactions is challenging and a favorable case is Xe+Pb, near the Coulomb barrier, because their neutron shell-closures play a stabilizing role, favoring the proton-transfer from lead to xenon. TOF-TOF data were analyzed to reconstruct the mass-energy distribution of the primary fragments. Preliminary results of an experiment held at Laboratori Nazionali di Legnaro with PRISMA, aimed at A and Z identification of the products, will be shown.

Gamma rays as probe of fission and quasi-fission dynamics in the reaction 32S + 197Au near the Coulomb barrier

Compound nucleus fission and quasi-fission are both binary decay channels whose common properties make the experimental separation between them difficult. A way to achieve this separation could be to probe the angular momentum of the binary fragments. This can be done detecting gamma rays in coincidence with the two fragments. As a case study, the reaction 32S + 197Au near the Coulomb barrier has been performed at the Tandem ALTO facility at IPN ORSAY. ORGAM and PARIS, two different gamma detectors arrays, are coupled with the CORSET detector, a two-arm time-of-flight spectrometer. TOF-TOF data were analyzed to reconstruct the mass-energy distribution of the primary fragments coupled with gamma multiplicity and spectroscopic analysis. Preliminary results of will be shown.

Inverse Quasifission in 156,160 Gd + 186 W Reactions

To investigate the impact shell effects have in the formation of neutron-rich fragments in multinucleon transfer reactions, a series of experiments to explore the binary channel in 156,160Gd + 186W reactions at energies near and above the Coulomb barrier is performed at the Flerov Laboratory’s U-400 accelerator using the CORSET setup. These experiments are aimed mainly at obtaining the production cross sections of leadlike fragments in the process of inverse quasifission. The mass, energy, and angular distributions of the binary reaction products are measured at energies of 860 and 935 MeV of 160Gd ions and 878MeV in the case of 156Gd ions. The excitation energies of primary fragments are estimated using their measured mass–energy distributions. Enhanced yields of products with masses of 200–215 amu are observed for both reactions. At energies above the barrier for side-to-side collisions (935 MeV), the yield of lead-like fragments is an order of magnitude larger than at energies near the Coulomb barrier, due possibly to the influence of orientation effects. The enhancement observed in the yield of reaction products with masses heavier than the target mass confirms that multinucleon transfer reactions can be used to obtain new neutron-rich isotopes, and to synthesize new superheavy elements.