Trajectories of ground state(p,t)cross sections and the structural classification of nuclei

Abstract

Cross sections for the $(p,t)$ reaction to ground states of even-even nuclei from Zr to Hg are interpreted in a simple approach. They are shown to be sensitive both to the degree of shell filling (which is related to the number of $L=0$ pairs in the ground state) and to the difference in the number of these pairs between target and final nuclei (that is, to the overlap of the initial and final systems). The cross sections separate according to the two broad classes of nuclei---vibrational and rotational. The analysis is carried out in both a model-independent way and within the framework of the interacting boson approximation.