Orientations of fragments emitted in binary cold fission of 252Cf

Abstract

The dependence of the driving potential on the orientation of fragments at scission is investigated for the case of cold fission of 252Cf. It is shown that in the case of cold fission the fragments exclusively emerge at scission in the pole–pole configuration. However, quantum fluctuations enable small deviations from this configuration during the tunnelling process. The mass yields of fission fragment pairs in the cold fission of 252Cf are computed for pole–pole and equator–equator orientations and are compared to the experimental data.