New insights into fission from recent experiments: What drives fission across the nuclear chart?

by Dr Christelle Schmitt (IPHC Strasbourg)

Monday 28 Jun 2021, 14:00 → 16:00 Europe/Warsaw

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83016328349?pwd=aFFUZExIU3J4Y0dzUkZ0V3ZMRDJtQT09 (zoom)

 

Nuclear fission owes its name by the fact that it resembles the division of living cells. But hidden behind is the complex re-arrangement of a many-body quantum system involving two types of nucleons, the protons and the neutrons. As a consequence, the process revealed to be a rich laboratory for studying fundamental nuclear properties, in general, and dynamical aspects of nuclear reactions, in particular. The importance of fission in astrophysics and for a wide variety of societal applications is established also.

Several probes have been proposed to study fission. In this presentation, we focus on the characterization of the fission-fragment products in terms of mass, charge and energy, and on their de-excitation. Recent experimental advances in the region of actinides and neutron-deficient lead are used to demonstrate the step forward in the field made from most accurate measurements. A consistent analysis of the information collected during the last years shows that the protons - which importance was overlooked so far, are key drivers of fission over the nuclear chart. A brief discussion of state-of-the-art models is finally proposed, emphasizing the necessary theoretical development regarding the dynamical transition from a fissioning-system- to a nascent-fragment-driven process.