Proceedings of the DAE Symp. on Nucl. Phys.

63 (2018) 480

Ternary fission of superheavy nucleus Z=126

S. Subramanian1,2 , S. Selvaraj2 , and M. T. Senthil Kannan3
1
Department of Physics, V.O. Chidambaram College∗ , Tuticorin - 628 008.
2
Department of Physics, The M.D.T. Hindu College∗ , Tirunelveli - 627 004.
∗
(Affiliated to M.S. University, Tirunelveli - 627 012.) and
3
Department of Physics, Bharathiar University, Coimbatore - 641 046.

Introduction The excitation energy of the fragments is

Theoretical studies on ternary fission as well given as,
as heavy particle radioactivity indicate that Ei∗ = Ei (T ) − Ei (T = 0). (2)
these exotic decay modes may be a possible
decay mode to look for, with respect to the Within the Fermi gas approximation, the
competing α decay mode in the superheavy level density parameter ai can be computed
nuclei. The fission barrier almost vanishes in from excitation energy as,
the superheavy elements [1]. However, the Ei∗
microscopic shell effects strongly enhance the ai = . (3)
Ti2
stability of superheavy elements and are re-
ported using theoretical models [2]. Schultheis The total energy Ei (T ) and the ground
et al [3] calculated the binary and ternary fis- state energy Ei (T = 0) of the ith fragment
sion barriers in the superheavy nuclei and re- in terms of the single particle energies are cal-
ported that both are equal within 10%. Fur- culated by,
ther, the relative rates ΓT /ΓB are consider-
X X
Ei (T ) = nZ Z
k k + nN N
k k
ably higher in Z = 126 isotopes with the con- k k
sideration of Z = 114 and 126 as magic num- Z N
bers in the shell correction calculations. In
X X
Ei (T = 0) = Z
k + N
k (4)
this work, we study the ternary fission mass k=1 k=1
distribution of superheavy nucleus 324 126 with
the fixed third fragment A3 = 52 Ca and 68 Ni where nZ N
k and nk are the occupation proba-
within the framework of statistical theory. bilities of Z protons and N neutrons of the ith
fragment and the summation is for all the sin-
The method gle particle energies (s.p.e) considered. The
Statistical theory is applied to calculate the s.p.e of protons Z N
k and neutrons k are re-
ternary fragmentation probabilities [4]. The trieved from the Reference Input Parameter
excitation energy of the compound system is Library RIPL-3 [4]. Here, only the ground
shared by the ternary fragments. The excita- state s.p.e are considered and the temperature
tion energy of each fragmentation is obtained effect is included via the occupation number
by considering thermal equilibrium attained conservation.
at scission point [5]. The ternary fission prob- For the selection of fragmentations, we con-
ability of each fragmentation is directly pro- sider the charge to mass ratio of the parent
portional to the product of the level densities nucleus with respect to that of the fission frag-
of the individual fragments ρi , (i = 1, 2, 3 for ments [4]. The relative yield at scission is
ternary fission) P (Aj , Zj ) = ρ1 ρ2 ρ3 . Further, calculated as the ratio between the probabil-
the level density is given as, ity of a particular ternary fragmentation and
the sum of the probabilities of all the possible
1

π2
1/4  p  ternary fragmentations and it is given by,
∗−5/4
ρi (Ei∗ ) = Ei exp 2 ai Ei∗ .
12 ai P (Aj , Zj )
Y (Aj , Zj ) = P , (5)
(1) P (Aj , Zj )

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Proceedings of the DAE Symp. on Nucl. Phys. 63 (2018) 481

0.08 0.06
128
324 E*=20 MeV 52
In E*=20 MeV
126 A = Ca 324

E*=35 MeV
3 126
0.07 E*=35 MeV
65 207
Mn Tl 0.05
E*=50 MeV 68 E*=50 MeV
A = Ni 130
3 126
In In
0.06 158
98 Nd
Sr
Relative Yield

Relative Yield
0.04 167
89 Gd
0.05 Se

0.04 208
0.03
37 176
Pb
64 Rb Tm
Cr
0.03
0.02
141
0.02 131 Ba
Sn

0.01
0.01

0.00 0.00

40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180 200 220 60 80 100 120 140 160 180

Fragments mass number (A & A ) Fragments mass number (A & A )

1 2 1 2

324 324
FIG. 1: Ternary fission of 126 for the fixed FIG. 2: Ternary fission of 126 for the fixed
A3 =52 Ca. A3 =68 Ni

with Aj = A1 + A2 + A3 and Zj = Z1 + Z2 + favourable combinations. At higher excita-

Z3 . The competing processes such as particle tion energies E ∗ = 30 and 50 MeV, the yield
emission, binary fragmentation are not consid- values of the fragments with neutron closed
ered in the calculation of ternary yields. The shell N ' 126, 82 increases and for the other
results presented are limited only to relative fragmentations yield value decreases. Further,
scission point yields that may lead to prompt for the fixed A3 =68 Ni, 158 N d +98 Sr +68
disintegration of a parent nucleus into three N i and 167 Gd +89 Se +68 N i are found as
fragments (democratic breakup). the more probable combinations at E ∗ =
20 and 35 MeV. At higher E ∗ = 50 MeV,
Results and discussions 128,130
In +128,126 In +68 N i are the most
In this work, the neutron rich magic num- favourable fragmentations with the neutron
ber nuclei 52 Ca and 68 Ni are considered as the closed shell around N ' 82.
third fragments. Further, we considered fixed In summary, we show that the ternary frag-
excitation energies of the parent as E ∗ =20, mentation of 324 126 is always accompanied
35 and 50 MeV. The fragmentations are ob- with the closed shell at the higher excitation
tained using the Z/A ratio with the condition energies.
A1 ≥ A2 ≥ A3 which is applied to avoid the
repetition of the fragmentations. The frag-
ment excitation energy and the level density References
are calculated using Eq. (2) and Eq. (1) re- [1] Yu. Ts. Oganessian and V. K. Utyonkov,
spectively. The yield values are calculated for Rep. Prog. Phys. 78, 036301 (2015).
the superheavy nucleus 324 126 with the fixed [2] S. Cwiok et al., Nucl. Phys. A 611, 211
A3 fragment and are plotted in Fig. 1 and 2 (1996).
as a function of other fragment mass numbers [3] H. Schultheis et al., Phys. Rev. C 15, 1601
(A1 and A2 ) . (1977).
From Fig. (1), for all the excitation en- [4] M. Balasubramaniam et al., Phys. Rev. C
ergies, the ternary fragmentation 207 T l +65 90, 054611 (2014).
M n +52 Ca is found to be the most favourable [5] M. T. Senthil Kannan and M. Balasubra-
combination. In addition, at lower E ∗ = maniam, Eur. Phys. J A 53, 164 (2017).
20MeV, 176 T m +96 Rb +52 Ca is also the

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