Indication for hyperdeformed cluster states in 233Th

• Published in: The European physical journal. A, Hadrons and nuclei Vol. 32; no. 2; pp. 165 - 173
• Main Authors: Nenoff, N., Bringel, P., Bürger, A., Chmel, S., Dababneh, S., Heil, M., Hübel, H., Käppeler, F., Neußer-Neffgen, A., Plag, R.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Heidelberg Springer Nature B.V 01-05-2007
• Subjects: Clusters; Configurations; Fission products; Mass distribution
• ISSN: 1434-6001; 1434-601X
• DOI: 10.1140/epja/i2007-10367-8

An activation technique was used to investigate relative yields of fission products from the reaction 232Th(n, f ) for neutron energies between 1.3 and 1.8MeV covering the region around the first hyperdeformed resonances. Intensities of characteristic γ-ray transitions were analyzed to search for changes in the mass distribution for neutron energies corresponding to the resonances and below the resonances. Relative increases in yield between 7 and 23% are observed for A ≈ 100 and 132 in the resonance region around 1.6MeV. It is proposed that the yield enhancement of daughter nuclei of the preformed fragments 132Sn and 101Zr arises from cold fission of a di-cluster configuration. The experimental results support theoretical predictions for the existence of hyperdeformed octupole shapes based on the di-nuclear configuration 132Sn + 101Zr.