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Superheavy elements are formed in fusion reactions which are hindered by fast nonequilibrium processes. To quantify these, mass-angle distributions and cross sections have been measured, at beam energies from below-barrier to 25% above, for the reactions of 48 Ca, 50 Ti, and 54 Cr with 208 Pb. Moving from 48 Ca to 54 Cr leads to a drastic fall in the symmetric fission yield, which is reflected in the measured massangle distribution by the presence of competing fast nonequilibrium deep inelastic and quasifission processes. These are responsible for reduction of the compound nucleus formation probablity P CN (as measured by the symmetric-peaked fission cross section), by a factor of 2.5 for 50 Ti and 15 for 54 Cr in comparison to 48 Ca. The energy dependence of P CN indicates that cold fusion reactions (involving 208 Pb) are not driven by a diffusion process.

The influence of alpha clustering on nuclear reaction dynamics is investigated using the giant dipole resonance (GDR) lineshape studies in the reactions 20 Ne (E lab =145,160 MeV) + 12 C and 20 Ne (E lab =160 MeV) + 27 Al , populating 32 S and 47 V, respectively. The GDR lineshapes from the two systems are remarkably different from each other. Whereas, the non alpha-like 47 V undergoes Jacobi shape transition and matches exceptionally well with the theoretical GDR lineshape estimated under the framework rotating liquid drop model (RLDM) and thermal shape fluctuation model (TSFM) signifying shape equilibration, for alpha cluster 32 S an extended prolate kind of shape is observed. This unusual deformation, seen directly via γ-decay for the first time, is predicted to be due to the formation of orbiting di-nuclear configuration or molecular structure of 16 O+ 16 O in 32 S superdeformed band.

The systematic evolution of the giant dipole resonance (GDR) width in the temperature region of 0.9 ∼ 1.4 MeV has been measured experimentally for 119 Sb using alpha induced fusion reaction and employing the LAMBDA high energy photon spectrometer. The temperatures have been precisely determined by simultaneously extracting the vital level density parameter from the neutron evaporation spectrum and the angular momentum from gamma multiplicity filter using a realistic approach. The systematic trend of the data seems to disagree with the thermal shape fluctuation model (TSFM). The model predicts the gradual increase of GDR width from its ground state value for T > 0 MeV whereas the measured GDR widths appear to remain constant at the ground state value till T ∼ 1 MeV and increase thereafter indicating towards a failure of the adiabatic assumption of the model at low temperature.

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Above-barrier complete fusion involving nuclides with low binding energy is typically suppressed by 30%. The mechanism that causes this suppression, and produces the associated incomplete fusion products, is controversial. We have developed a new experimental approach to investigate the mechanisms that produce incomplete fusion products, combining singles and coincidence measurements of light fragments and heavy residues in 7 Li þ 209 Bi reactions. For polonium isotopes, the dominant incomplete fusion product, only a small fraction can be explained by projectile breakup followed by capture: the dominant mechanism is triton cluster transfer. Suppression of complete fusion is therefore primarily a consequence of clustering in weakly bound nuclei rather than their breakup prior to reaching the fusion barrier. This implies that suppression of complete fusion will occur in reactions of nuclides where strong clustering is present.

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