Abstract
Problems of production and study of new neutron-enriched heavy nuclei are discussed. Low-energy multinucleon transfer reactions are shown to be quite appropriate for this purpose. Reactions with actinide beams and targets are of special interest for synthesis of new neutron-enriched transfermium nuclei and not-yet-known nuclei with closed neutron shell N = 126 having the largest impact on the astrophysical r-process. The estimated cross sections for the production of these nuclei look very promising for planning such experiments at currently available accelerators. These experiments, however, are rather expensive and difficult to perform because of low intensities of the massive projectile beams and problems of separating and detecting the heavy reaction products. Thus, realistic predictions of the corresponding cross sections for different projectile-target combinations are definitely required. Some uncertainty still remains in the values of several parameters used for describing the low-energy nuclear dynamics. This uncertainty does not allow one to perform very accurate predictions for the productions of new heavier-than-target (trans-target) nuclei in multinucle on transfer reactions. Nevertheless these predictions are rather promising (large cross sections) to start such experiments at available accelerators if the problem of separation of heavy transfer reaction products would be solved.
Highlights
The upper part of the present-day nuclear map consists mainly of proton rich nuclei, while the unexplored area of heavy neutron enriched nuclides is extremely important for nuclear astrophysics investigations and, in particular, for the understanding of the r process of astrophysical nucleogenesis
In our recent study we found that the shell effects may give us a gain in the yields of heavy neutron rich nuclei formed in multinucleon transfer reactions [1, 5,6,7]
For near barrier collisions of 238U with 248Cm cross sections higher than 1 pb have been predicted for the production of new neutron enriched isotopes of elements with Z≤106 located already at the stability line or even beyond it
Summary
The upper part of the present-day nuclear map consists mainly of proton rich nuclei, while the unexplored area of heavy neutron enriched nuclides ( those located along the neutron closed shell N = 126 to the right-hand side of the stability line) is extremely important for nuclear astrophysics investigations and, in particular, for the understanding of the r process of astrophysical nucleogenesis. Due to the bending of the stability line toward the neutron axis, in fusion reactions only proton-rich isotopes of heavy elements can be produced. Production and studying properties of nuclei located in this region will open a new field of research in nuclear physics. There are only three methods for the production of heavy elements, namely, fusion reactions, a sequence of neutron capture and β− decay processes and multi-nucleon transfer reactions
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