V. K. Utyonkov

Evaporation residue collection efficiencies and position spectra of the Dubna gas-filled recoil separator

Abstract The focal-plane position spectra and collection efficiencies of the Dubna gas-filled recoil separator at the U400 cyclotron used to separate evaporation residues of complete fusion reaction products are described. The separator consists of a 23°-dipole magnet and a quadrupole doublet and is filled with hydrogen at a pressure of about 1xa0Torr. After passing through the time-of-flight system, the separated evaporation residues are collected in a 120xa0mm×40xa0mm position-sensitive semiconductor detector at the focal plane. Depending on the asymmetry of the projectile, target combinations, the measured collection efficiencies were 3–45%, with suppression factors exceeding 10 15 and 10 4 for beam and target-like particles, respectively. The ANAMARI code that is used to determine the separator settings is described and its predictions for the evaporation residue position spectra and collection efficiencies are compared with experimental data.

On the stability of the nuclei of element 108 withA=263–265

In bombarding209Bi and207, 208Pb targets by55Mn and58Fe ions the yields of “cold fusion” reactions have been determined using a sensitive technique for detectingT1/2≧1 ms spontaneous fission and theα-decay of heavy actinide elements. It has been shown that theA = 263–265 isotopes of element 108, including the even-even isotope264108, undergo mainlyα-decay. The obtained results, together with the known data on the properties of the isotopes of elements 104 and 106, provide evidence for the enhanced stability of theZ=108 nuclei against spontaneous fission.

On the properties of the element 106 isotopes produced in the reactions Pb+54Cr

In54Cr ion bombardments of targets prepared from enriched lead isotopes the spontaneous fission probability for the isotopes of element 106 formed in the reactions Pb(54Cr, 1,2n)106 was investigated. The spontaneous fission half-life of the doubly-even isotope260106 has been shown to beTSF≳5 ms. The half-lives of neighbouring oddmass isotopes have also been estimated:TSF(259106)≳0.1 s andTSF(261106)≳0.4 s. The results of the experiments are discussed in comparison with the latest theoretical calculations.

Observation of Delayed Nuclear Fission in the Region of 180Hg

The formation of nuclides undergoing delayed fission with half-lives in the range of T1/2 1 s has been observed in fusion-evaporation reactions induced by 230 MeV 40Ca and 40Ar projectiles on isotopically enriched targets of 144Sm, 147Sm and 150Sm. The fission activity with T1/2 = 0.70+0.12-0.09 s produced in the 144Sm + 40Ca reaction has been found to be the most striking one. The origin of this activity is explained as being due to the β-delayed fission occurring in the chain . The discovery of β-delayed fission in the Hg region opens up valuable prospects for extending low-energy (E* ≤ Qβ+(EC)) fission studies to neutron-deficient nuclei of many elements belonging to the translanthanide part of the Mendeleev periodic table.

Random probability analysis of heavy-element data

Abstract In this paper, we present the Monte Carlo Random Probability (MCRP) calculational method details that were developed for the determination of random correlations in a set of unrelated data. After finding random correlations, we further process the correlations by applying nuclear property systematics. We compare the results of MCRP with methods presented in other references. The MCRP method can provide a conservative estimate of the random probability associated with observed events that takes into account the entire background observed in the experiment and any other running conditions (noise, decay of long-lived species, etc.) which may have been sporadic or intermittent. We discuss a particular example of a set of correlated alpha decays and its interpretation as a candidate decay chain.

Targets of uranium, plutonium, and curium for heavy-element research

The heavy-element research program of the Dubna gas-filled recoil separator requires the use of rather exotic, strongly radioactive targets which can withstand long-term, high-intensity heavy-ion bombardments. A number of targets with thicknesses of 0.1–0.8 mg/cm2 deposited on various backings by different techniques such as electrospraying, mechanical painting with organic solutions, as well as molecular plating or electrodeposition from organic solutions were tested. The best results were obtained for electroplated targets deposited on 1.5 μm Ti backings. Isotopically enriched targets of 235,236,238U, 242,244Pu, and 248Cm mounted on rotating disks were irradiated by ions ranging from neon to argon with intensities up to 2 × 1013pps delivered by the U400 cyclotron. During two months of irradiation the total beam dose of the 34S ions applied to the target of 244Pu reached 2.5 × 1019. Collaborative Dubna-Livermore experiments were performed in 1993–1995 by employing the Dubna gas-filled recoil separator and resulted in the discovery of the new nuclides 262104, 265106, 266106, 267108, and 273110. The experiments aimed at the synthesis of element 114 are under preparation. Target fabrication methods and experimental results for nuclear physics studies at Coulomb energies are described.

Study of the stability of the ground states and K-isomeric states of 250Fm and 254102 against spontaneous fission

By employing the 249Cf(4He, 3n) and 208Pb(48Ca, 2n) reactions, experiments to study the stability against spontaneous fission of the nuclides 250Fm and 254102 as well as of the two-quasi-particle (2q-p) K isomers 250mFm (T1/2 = 1.8 ± 0.1 s) and 254m102 (T1/2 = 0.28 ± 0.04s) have been performed. The ground-state spontaneous fission of the two nuclides has been discovered and the corresponding branching ratios bsf and partial half-lives Tsf, respectively, have been determined to be: (6.9 ± 1.0) × 10−5, 0.83 ± 0.15 yr for 250Fm; (1.7 ± 0.5) × 10−3, (3.2 ± 0.9) × 104s for 254102. As a by-product of these studies, new data about cross sections of the 206,208Pb(48Ca, xn) reactions have been obtained. Experiments designed to search for the spontaneous fission decay of the 2q-p K-isomeric states in 250Fm and 254102 have not revealed the effect in question. The lower limits of the ratios of the partial spontaneous fission half-lives for the 2q-p K-isomeric states to those for the respective ground states, Tsf*/Tsf, have been established to be ≥ 10−1 for 250mFm/250Fm and ≥ 5 × 10−3 for 254m102/254102. This means that the stability of the 2q-p K-isomeric states in 250Fm and 254102 against spontaneous fission is practically not inferior to that of the ground states of these nuclei. In accord with the experimental findings, the theoretical estimates of Tsf*/Tsf made in the present paper show that, due to the influence of the specialization and blocking effects on the potential energy and the effective mass associated with fission, spontaneous fission from 2q-p K-isomeric states cannot be facilitated but, on the contrary, should be essentially hindered compared with ground-state spontaneous fission.

Observation of enhanced nuclear stability near the 162 neutron shell

In bombardments of {sup 248}Cm with {sup 22}Ne the authors discovered two new isotopes, {sup 265}106 and {sup 266}106, by establishing genetic links between {alpha} decays of the 106 nuclides and SF or {alpha} decays of the daughter (grand-daughter) nuclides. For {sup 266}106 they measured E{sub {alpha}}=8.62{+-}0.06 MeV followed by the SF decay of {sup 262}104 for which they measured a half-life value of 1.2{sup +1.0}{sub {minus}0.5} s. For {sup 265}106 they measured E{sub {alpha}}=8.82{+-}0.06 MeV. They estimated {alpha} half-lives of 10-30 s for {sup 266}106 and 2-30 s for {sup 265}106 with SF branches of {approximately}50% or less. The decay properties of {sup 266}106 indicate a large enhancement in the SF stability of this N=160 nuclide and confirm the existence of the predicted neutron-deformed shell N=162.

Spontaneous fission of light californium isotopes produced in 206,207,208Pb + 34,36S reactions; new nuclide 238Cf

Abstract In bombardments of 206,207,208Pb with 34S and 206Pb with 36S, we identified a new spontaneously fissioning isotope 238Cf with T sf ≈ T 1 2 = 21 ± 2 ms and obtained evidence of the production of a new isotope 237Cf with T 1 2 = 2.1 ± 0.3 s . The spontaneous-fission (SF) decay mode was established for 240Cf; its SF branch was estimated to be bsf ∼ 2 × 10−2. We measured also bsf ⩽ 1.4 × 10−4 for 242Cf and estimated bsf ∼ 10−1 for 237Cf. The production cross sections of 238Cf in the 206,207,208 Pb + 34 S reactions were measured to be in the range of 0.3 to 1.1 nb. Finally, we probed the influence of the neutron excess in the N = 20 projectile 36S on cross sections of fusion-evaporation reactions occurring on lead targets.

VSHEC—A program for the automatic spectrum calibration☆

Abstract Calibration is the transformation of the output channels of a measuring device into the physical values (energies, times, angles, etc.). If dealt with manually, it is a labor- and time-consuming procedure even if only a few detectors are used. However, the situation changes appreciably if a calibration of multi-detector systems is required, where the number of registering devices extends to hundreds (Tsyganov etxa0al. (2004) [1] ). The calibration is aggravated by the fact that needed pivotal channel numbers should be determined from peak-like distributions. But peak distribution is an informal pattern so that a procedure of pattern recognition should be employed to discard the operator interference. The automatic calibration is the determination of the calibration curve parameters on the basis of reference quantity list and the data which partially are characterized by these quantities (energies, angles, etc). The program allows the physicist to perform the calibration of the spectrometric detectors for both the cases: that of one tract and that of many. Program summary Program title: VSHEC Catalogue identifier: AENN_v1_0 Program summary URL: http://cpc.cs.qub.ac.uk/summaries/AENN_v1_0.html Program obtainable from: CPC Program Library, Queen’s University, Belfast, N. Ireland Licensing provisions: Standard CPC licence, http://cpc.cs.qub.ac.uk/licence/licence.html No. of lines in distributed program, including test data, etc.: 6403 No. of bytes in distributed program, including test data, etc.: 325847 Distribution format: tar.gz Programming language: DELPHI-5 and higher. Computer: Any IBM PC compatible. Operating system: Windows XX. Classification: 2.3, 4.9. Nature of problem: Automatic conversion of detector channels into their energy equivalents. Solution method: Automatic decomposition of a spectrum into geometric figures such as peaks and an envelope of peaks from below, estimation of peak centers and search for the maximum peak center subsequence which matches the reference energies in the statistically most plausible way. Running time: On Celeron (R) (CPU 2.66 GHh) it is the time needed for the dialog via the visual interface. Pure computation—less than 1xa0s for the test run.