Sub-barrier fusion reactions

Abstract

The concept of compound nucleus was proposed by Niels Bohr in 1936 to explain narrow resonances observed in scattering of a slow neutron off atomic nuclei. A compound nucleus is a metastable state with a long lifetime, in which all the degrees of freedom are in a sort of thermal equilibrium. Fusion reactions are defined as reactions to form such compound nucleus by merging two atomic nuclei. Here a short description of heavy-ion fusion reactions at energies close the Coulomb barrier is presented. This includes: (i) an overview of a fusion process, (ii) a strong interplay between nuclear structure and fusion, (iii) fusion and multi-dimensional/multiparticle quantum tunneling, and (iv) fusion for superheavy elements.

A Study on Heavy-Ion Fusion Reactions at Extreme Subbarrier Energies

“…The difference between the sudden and the adiabatic models is schematically illustrated in Fig. (4).…”

“…The related differences between experimental cross sections and those of the standard CC calculations, which appeared for some colliding systems at energies well below the Coulomb barrier, led the researchers to improve coupled channel model calculations. Readers are referred to [3,4] for a more detailed investigation.…”