Fusion reactions with the halo nucleus $^{15}$C

ORAL

Abstract

We have for the first time studied the fusion-fission excitation functions for the systems $^{14,15}$C + $^{232}$Th at energies in the vicinity of the Coulomb barrier. A radioactive $^{15}$C beam was produced using the ATLAS In-Flight Technique at Argonne National Laboratory. The intensity of the $^{15}$C beam was on the order of $1\times10^6$ ions/s at the highest energy with a $^{14}$C contamination of only 3\%. The results of the experiment show that at energies below the barrier, the fusion cross section of the halo nucleus $^{15}$C, with an s$_{1/2}$ neutron weakly bound to the closed neutron shell nucleus $^{14}$C, is enhanced by a factor of 2-5, while the fusion cross section for $^{14}$C follows a trend similar to that of $^{12,13}$C. The experimental results will be presented and compared to various theoretical models.

*Supported by the U.S. DOE ONP DE-AC02-06CH11357 (ANL) and DE-FG02-04ER41320 (WMU) and NSF JINA Grant PHY0822648.

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Authors

  • M. Alcorta

  • K.E. Rehm

  • B.B. Back

  • P.F. Bertone

  • B. DiGiovine

  • H. Esbensen

  • J.P. Greene

  • C.R. Hoffman

  • C.L. Jiang

  • R.C. Pardo

  • A.M. Rogers

    • Argonne National Laboratory

  • S. Bedoor

  • A.H. Wuosmaa

    • Western Michigan University

  • C.M. Deibel

    • Argonne National Laboratory and JINA

  • J.C. Lighthall

  • S.T. Marley

    • Argonne National Laboratory and Western Michigan University

  • M. Paul

    • Hebrew University

  • C. Ugalde

    • Argonne National Laboratory and University of Chicago and JINA