Search

The study of single-nucleon transfer reactions for the 18O+48Ti system was pursued at the energy of 275 MeV as part of a more systematic study which is undertaken within the NUMEN and NURE experimental campaigns. The aim is to measure the complete set of available reaction network which are characterized by the same initial and final-state wavefunctions as the more suppressed double charge exchange reactions. Understanding the degree of competition between successive nucleon transfer and double charge exchange reactions is crucial for the description of the meson-exchange mechanism. In this respect, angular distribution measurements for one- and twonucleon transfer reactions for the 18O+48Ti system were carried out at theMAGNEX facility of INFN-LNS in Catania. An overview of the data analysis for the 48Ti(18O,19F)47Sc and 48Ti(18O,17O)49Ti reactions will be presented.

The 4He+4He inelastic scattering was experimentally investigated in an exclusive measurement at the MAGNEX facility of INFN - LNS, aiming at characterizing the 0+2 resonant state of 4He. Both the 4He+4He→4He+4He∗→4He+3H+p and 4He+4He→4He+4He∗→4He+3He+n configurations were measured together with an elastic scattering measurement in a wide angular range. In the present article, the experimental setup, the measurement and the data reduction are briefly described, pointing out the significance of an exclusive inelastic scattering measurement to suppress the background originating from other processes.

The 4He(4He,4He)4He* inelastic scattering was revisited in a new coincidence measurement at the MAGNEX facility of Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare – Laboratori Nazionali del Sud. The 4He + 4He → 4He + 4He* → 4He + 3H + 1H and 4He + 4He → 4He + 4He* → 4He + 3He + n reactions were measured simultaneously by detecting the 4He particles at the MAGNEX magnetic spectrometer in coincidence with the 3H and 3He at the OSCAR silicon telescope. The main concept of the experiment is described and the data reduction strategy is reported.

The 18O+48Ti reaction was studied at the energy of 275 MeV for the first time under the NUMEN and NURE experimental campaigns with the aim to investigate the complete net of reaction channels potentially involved in the 48Ca→48Ti double charge exchange transition. Such a transition is of great interest because of its relevance to the extraction of 48Ca→48Ti double beta decay nuclear matrix element. The relevant experiment was carried out at the MAGNEX facility of INFN-LNS in Catania. Angular distribution measurements for the various reaction products were performed by using the MAGNEX large acceptance magnetic spectrometer. The present contribution is focused on the analysis of the one-proton transfer channel with emphasis on the particle identification technique and the estimation of background contaminations.

We describe our efforts to study the production of neutron-rich isotopes from peripheral reactions of medium-mass heavy ions with the MAGNEX spectrometer at the INFN-LNS in Catania, Italy. Experimental data were obtained for the 70Zn+64Ni reaction at 15 MeV/nucleon. For the analysis of the data, we developed a new procedure for the reconstruction of both the atomic number Z and the ionic charge q of the ions, which is then followed by the identification of the mass. Preliminary results and the analysis plan will be discussed.

Elastic scattering and breakup angular distribution measurements for the systems 6,7Li + p were performed at the MAGNEX facility of the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare-Laboratori Nazionali del Sud (INFN-LNS) in Catania, in the energy range of (2.3–5.4)AMeV. The breakup channel was identified and quantified adopting the algorithm MULTIP.Within this algorithm which is a Monte Carlo simulation code, the history of the breakup fragments can be tagged from the rest frame of the decay nucleus itself to the laboratory frame. Angular distribution data of both elastic scattering and breakup were analyzed under the same theoretical model and the influence of continuum on the elastic channel was investigated.

We investigated the reaction dynamics induced by the 7Be,8B+208Pb collisions at energies around the Coulomb barrier. Charged particles originated by both the col- lisions were detected by means of 6 ΔE-Eres telescopes of a newly developed detector array. Experimental data were analysed within the framework of the Optical Model and the total reaction cross-sections were compared together and with the 6,7Li+208Pb colli-sion data. According to the preliminary results, 7Be nucleus reactivity is rather similar to the 7Li one whereas the 8B+208Pb total reaction cross section appears to be much larger than those measured for reactions induced by the other weakly-bound projectiles on the same target.

The goal of NUMEN project is to access experimentally driven information on Nuclear Matrix Elements (NME) involved in the neutrinoless double beta decay (0νββ), by high-accuracy measurements of the cross sections of Heavy Ion (HI) induced Double Charge Exchange (DCE) reactions. The knowledge of the nuclear matrix elements is crucial to infer the neutrino average masses from the possible measurement of the half-life of 00νββ decay and to compare experiments on different isotopes. In particular, the (18O, 18Ne) and (20Ne, 20O) reactions are performed as tools for β+β+ and β-β- decays, respectively. The experiments are performed at INFN - Laboratory Nazionali del Sud (LNS) in Catania using the Superconducting Cyclotron (CS) to accelerate the beams and the MAGNEX magnetic spectrometer to detect the reaction products. The measured cross sections are very low, limiting the present exploration to few selected isotopes of interest in the context of typically low-yield experimental runs. In order to make feasible a systematic study of all the candidate nuclei, a major upgrade of the LNS facility is foreseen to increase the experimental yield of about two orders of magnitude. To this purpose, frontier technologies are going to be developed for both the accelerator and the detection systems. In parallel, advanced theoretical models will be developed to extract the nuclear structure information from the measured cross sections.

The excitation of the Dynamical Dipole mode along the fusion path was investigated for the first time in the formation of a heavy compound nucleus in the A~190 mass region. The compound nucleus was formed at identical conditions of excitation energy and spin from two entrance channels having different charge asymmetry: the charge asymmetric 40Ca + 152Sm and the nearly charge symmetric 48Ca + 144Sm at Elab=11 and 10.1 MeV/nucleon, respectively. Both fusion–evaporation and fission events were studied simultaneously for the first time. The Dynamical Dipole mode excitation in the charge asymmetric channel was evidenced, in a model-independent way, by comparing the γ-ray multiplicity spectra and angular distributions of the two entrance channels with each other.

The Trojan Horse Method (THM) has been applied extensively for the last 25 years to measure nuclear reaction cross sections of interest for astrophysics. Although it has been mainly applied for charged particle-induced reactions, recently it has been found to have also a relevant role for neutron-induced reactions. Here, some advantages of THM will be discussed and the preliminary results of the cosmological relevant 7Be(n,α)4He cross section measurement are discussed.

The scattering process of weakly-bound nuclei at Coulomb barrier energies provides deep insights on the reaction dynamics induced by exotic nuclei. Within this framework, we measured for the first time the scattering process of the short-lived Radioactive Ion Beam (RIB) 8B (S p = 0.1375 MeV) from a 208Pb target at 50 MeV beam energy. The 8B RIB was produced by means of the in-flight facility CRIB (RIKEN, Japan) with an average intensity on target of 10 kHz and a purity about 25%. Elastically scattering ions were detected in the angular range θc.m. = 10°-160° by means of the detector array EXPADES. A preliminary optical model analysis indicates a total reaction cross section of about 1 b, a value, once reduced, 2-3 times larger than those obtained for the reactions induced by the stable weakly-bound projectiles 6,7Li on a 208Pb target in the energy range around the Coulomb barrier.

The scattering process of the Radioactive Ion Beam 7Be from a 208Pb target was measured at three near-barrier energies. The quasi-elastic angular distributions were analyzed within the framework of the optical model to extract the reaction cross sections. The results are compared with those obtained for the reactions induced by the mirror projectile 7Li and by the lightest particle-stable lithium isotope 6Li on the same target. The angular distributions for the production of the two 7Be constituent clusters, namely 3He and 4He, were also measured. In agreement with what observed for the interaction of 7Be with lighter targets, the production of the heavier helium isotope resulted to be much more abundant than that of its lighter counterpart.

Within the frame of the commissioning of a new experimental apparatus EXPADES we undertook the measurement of the elastic scattering angular distribution for the system 17O+208Pb at energy around the Coulomb barrier. The reaction dynamics induced by loosely bound Radioactive Ion Beams is currently being extensively studied [4]. In particular the study of the elastic scattering process allows to obtain direct information on the total reaction cross section of the exotic nuclei. In order to understand the effect of the low binding energy on the reaction mechanism it is important to compare radioactive weakly bound nuclei with stable strongly-bound nuclei. In this framework the study of the 17O+208Pb elastic scattering can be considered to be complementary to a previous measurement of the total reaction cross section for the system 17F+208Pb at energies of 86, 90.4 MeV [5, 6]. The data will be compared with those obtained for the neighboring systems 16,18O+208Pb and others available in literature.

The excitation of the dynamical dipole mode along the fusion path was investigated in the formation of a heavy compound nucleus in the A=190 mass region. To form the compound nucleus, the 40Ca + 152Sm and 48Ca + 144Sm reactions were employed at Elab=11 and 10.1 MeV/nucleon, respectively. Both fusion–evaporation and fission events were studied simultaneously for the first time. Our results for evaporation and fission events (preliminary) show that the dynamical dipole mode survives in reactions involving heavier nuclei than those studied previously.

We investigated the reaction dynamics induced by the Radioactive Ion Beams 7Be and 8B on a 208Pb target at energies around the Coulomb barrier. The two measurements are strongly interconnected, being 7Be (Sα = 1.586 MeV) the loosely bound core of the even more exotic 8B (Sp = 0.1375 MeV) nucleus. Here we summarize the present status of the data analysis for the measurement of the elastic scattering process for both reactions and the preliminary results for the optical model analysis of the collected data.

Due to their high selectivity, transfer and sequential decay reactions are powerful tools for studies of both single particle (nucleon) and cluster states in light nuclei. Their use is particularly simple for investigations of α-particle clustering (because α-particle has Jπ=0+, which simplifies spin and parity assignments to observed cluster states), but they are also easily applicable to other types of clustering. Recent results on clustering in neutron-rich isotopes of beryllium, boron and carbon obtained measuring the 10B+10B reactions (at 50 and 72 MeV) are presented. The highly efficient and segmented detector systems used, built from 4 Double Sided Silicon Strip Detectors (DSSSD) allowed detection of double and multiple coincidences and, in that way, studies of states populated in transfer reactions, as well as their sequential decay.

The reaction dynamics of collisions involving halo or weakly bound nuclei, at energies around the Coulomb barrier, can be strongly affected by the structure of such nuclei. Very strong entrance channel effects have been observed on various reaction pocess such as, elastic scattering, fusion and direct reactions when comparing collision induced by the 6He and 11Be halo nuclei with the ones induced by their cores 4He and 10Be. Collisions induced by the stable weakly bound nuclei 6Li, 7Li show also some peculiarities in comparison to the ones induced by well bound nuclei; coupling with the break-up channel is in fact very important in reproducing low energy data. In this contribution an overview of our present understanding of the discussed topic will be given along with the discussion of some new preliminary results.

The experimental elastic scattering angular distributions of the collisions involving the weakly bound nuclei 6,7Li and the halo nucleus 6He on the same 64Zn target at several energies around the Coulomb barrier were measured at the Laboratori Nazionali del Sud (LNS, Italy), and the Cyclotron Research Center, Louvain La Neuve (Belgium), respectively. The experimental elastic scattering angular distributions of the 6,7Li + 64Zn systems have been analyzed within the continuumdiscretized coupled-channels method, while the 6He + 64Zn data have been compared with both continuum-discretized coupled-channels and coupled-reaction-channels calculations.

In this work the effects of the segmentation of the electrodes of Double Sided Silicon Strip Detectors (DSSSDs) are investigated. In order to characterize the response of the DSSSDs we perform a first experiment by using tandem beams of different energies directly sent on the detector and a second experiment by mean of a proton microbeam. Results show that the effective width of the inter-strip region and the efficiency for full energy detection, varies with both detected energy and bias voltage. The experimental results are qualitatively reproduced by a simplified model based on the Shockley-Ramo-Gunn framework.

The fusion excitation function of 48Ti + 58Fe has been measured in a wide energy range around the Coulomb barrier, covering 6 orders of magnitude of the cross sections. We present here the preliminary results of this experiment, and a full comparison with the near-by system 58Ni + 54Fe where evidence of fusion hindrance shows up at relatively high cross sections. The sub-barrier cross sections of 48Ti + 58Fe are much larger than those of 58Ni + 54Fe. Significant differences are also observed in the logarithmic derivatives, astro-physical S-factors and fusion barrier distributions. The influence of low-energy nuclear structure on all these trends is pointed out and commented. Coupled-channels calculations using a Woods-Saxon potential are able to reproduce the experimental results for 48Ti + 58Fe. The logarithmic derivative of the excitation function is very nicely fit, and no evidence of hindrance is observed down to around 1 μb. The fusion barrier distribution is rather wide, flat and structureless. It is only in qualitative agreement with the calculated distribution.

The sub-barrier fusion excitation function of 40Ca + 96Zr has been measured down to cross sections ≃2.4µb, i.e. two orders of magnitude smaller than obtained in the previous experiment, where the sub-barrier fusion of this system was found to be greatly enhanced with respect to 40Ca + 90Zr, and the need of coupling to transfer channels was suggested. The purpose of this work was to investigate the behavior of 40Ca + 96Zr fusion far below the barrier. The smooth trend of the excitation function has been found to continue, and the logarithmic slope increases very slowly. No indication of hindrance shows up, and a comparison with 48Ca + 96Zr is very useful in this respect. A new CC analysis of the complete excitation function has been performed, including explicitly one- and two-nucleon Q >0 transfer channels. Such transfer couplings bring significant cross section enhancements, even at the level of a few µb. Locating the hindrance threshold, if any, in 40Ca + 96Zr would require challenging measurements of cross sections in the sub-µb range.

The results concerning the study of 6Li+120Sn and 7Li+119Sn systems are presented. These two sistems are characterised by very similar structures of the interacting nuclei and by different Q-value for one-and two- neutron transfer. Our aim is to disentangle the possible effects due to the different n-transfer Q-values, at sub-barriers energies, by comparing the two fusion excitation function. In these experiments the fusion cross section has been measured by using a stack activation technique. No particular differences in the two fusion excitation functions have been observed.

The elastic and break-up angular distributions of the 10,11Be+64Zn reactions measured at Ec.m.≈1.4 VC have been analysed within the CCDC and O.M. frameworks. The suppression of the Coulomb-nuclear interference, observed in the 11Be scattering case with respect to the 10Be, has been interpreted as due to a long range absorption owing to the coupling with the break-up (Coulomb and nuclear) channels. The presence of 10Be events on the 11Be experiment data have been explained as due mainly to break-up processes.

We measured elastic scattering angular distributions and cross sections for heavy residue production for the systems 6,7Li+64Zn at different energies around the Coulomb barrier. The elastic scattering angular distributions have been reproduced by optical model fits using a renormalized double folding potential for the real and imaginary parts. Absence of usual threshold anomaly in the optical potential was found. The excitation functions for heavy residue production were measured using an activation technique. Comparison with different calculations suggest that complete fusion is the dominant reaction mechanism above the barrier whereas, below the Coulomb barrier, incomplete fusion and transfer dominate.

Fusion excitation functions of light heavy-ion systems show oscillatory structures above the Coulomb barrier, caused by resonances or due to the penetration of successive centrifugal barriers well separated in energy. In heavier systems, the amplitude of oscillations decreases and the peaks get nearer to each other. This makes the measurements very challenging. We have performed a first experiment for 28Si + 28Si, by measuring fusion cross sections (σ) in an energy range of ≃15 MeV above the barrier, with a small ΔElab = 0.5 MeV step. Three regular oscillations are clearly observed, which are best revealed by plotting the energy-weighted derivative of the excitation function. The excitation function has been recently measured down to cross sections ≤1μb with larger energy steps. Coupled-channel (CC) calculations based on a shallow potential in the entrance channel are able to reproduce the oscillations. A further analysis will provide a stringent test for the calculations, in particular for the choice of the ion-ion potential, because the subbarrier excitation function has to be reproduced as well. Coupled-channel (CC) calculations based on a shallow potential in the entrance channel are able to reproduce the oscillations. A further analysis will provide a stringent test for the calculations, in particular for the choice of the ion-ion potential, because the subbarrier excitation function has to be reproduced as well.

The dynamical dipole mode was investigated in the mass region of the 192Pb compound nucleus, by using the 40Ca + 152Sm and 48Ca + 144Sm reactions at Elab=11 and 10.1 MeV/nucleon, respectively. Both fusion–evaporation and fission events were studied simultaneously for the first time. Our results show that the dynamical dipole mode survives in reactions involving heavier nuclei than those studied previously, however, its yield is lower than that expected within BNV calculations.

We measured for the first time 7Be elastically scattered nuclei as well as 3,4He reaction products from a 58Ni target at 22.3 MeV beam energy. The data were analyzed within the optical model formalism to extract the total reaction cross section. Extensive kinematical, Distorted Wave Born Approximation (DWBA)and Continuum Discretized Coupled Channel (CDCC) calculations were performed to investigate the 3,4He originating mechanisms and the interplay between different reaction channels.

Fusion excitation functions have been measured for the 6Li+120Sn and 7Li+119Sn systems at energies around the Coulomb barrier, to investigate the effects of neutron transfer and breakup on the fusion process. At energies above the barrier, a suppression of the complete fusion excitation function with respect to the prediction of the 1D - Barrier Penetration Model has been observed, in both cases. At energies below the Coulomb barrier, no significant difference between the two excitation function, imputable to the different neutron transfer Q-values of the two systems has been observed.

Elastic scattering has been studied for the collisions induced by 17O on 58Ni target at energies around and above the Coulomb barrier. The elastic scattering angular distributions were measured for several energies and were analyzed within the framework of the optical model to obtain total reaction cross sections. The reaction cross-sections of the tightly bound 17O were compared with those of weakly bound 17F on the same targets in order to investigate the effects of the low binding energy in the reaction dynamics.

Elastic scattering angular distributions and heavy residue production cross sections have been measured at different energies around the Coulomb barrier for the systems 6,7Li+64Zn. Optical model fits of the elastic angular distributions were performed using a renormalized double folding potential and absence of usual threshold anomaly in the optical potential was found. Excitation functions for heavy residue production have been measured using an activation technique. Comparison of the data with the results of different calculations show that complete fusion is the dominant reaction mechanism above the barrier, whereas the heavy residue yield below the barrier is mainly due to incomplete fusion and transfer.

The structure of the weakly bound nuclei is expected to influence the fusion mechanism at energies around and below the Coulomb barrier. Infact direct channels may be favoured with respect to fusion by the low binding energies, while Coupling of the break-up channel can be responsible for a fusion cross-section enhancement. In this context the 6Li+64Zn collision has been studied at several energies around the Coulomb barrier. The fusion cross section was measured by using an activation technique where the radioactive evaporation residues produced in the reaction were identified by the X-ray emission which follows their electron capture decay. The elastic scattering angular distributions were analyzed within the Optical Model and total reaction cross-sections were deduced from optical model calculations.

A new measurement of fusion cross-section for the system 4He+64Zn was performed at sub-barrier energy in order to cover the same energy region of previous measurements of 6He+64Zn. The fusion cross-section was obtained using an activation technique. From the comparison of the two excitation functions an enhancement of the fusion cross section was observed, at energy below the Coulomb barrier, in the reaction induced by 6He in respect to the one induced by 4He.

The scattering processes of two mirror projectiles, the well bound 17O (Sn = 4.143 MeV) and the loosely bound radioactive 17F (Sp = 0.600 MeV), on the proton closed shell target 58Ni were measured at several energies around the Coulomb barrier. The experimental data were analyzed within the framework of the optical model to extract the reaction cross section and to investigate the role played by direct reaction channels at near-barrier energies. The comparison shows a similar behaviour for the two A = 17 projectiles despite their very different binding energies and suggests a rather small effect of the 17F breakup channel on the reaction dynamics.

The collision induced by the three Beryllium isotopes, 9,10,11Be, on a 64Zn target were investigated at Ec.m. ≈ 1.4 the Coulomb barrier. The experiments with the radioactive 10,11Be beams were performed at the Rex-Isolde facility at CERN. In the case of 9,10Be, elastic scattering angular distributions were measured whereas, in the 11Be case, the quasielastic scattering angular distribution was obtained. A strong damping of the quasielastic cross-section was observed in the 11Be case, in the angular range around the Coulomb-nuclear interference peak. In this latter case a large total-reaction cross-section is found. Such a cross-section is more than a factor of two larger than the ones extracted in the reactions induced by the non-halo Beryllium isotopes. A large contribution to the total-reaction cross-section in the 11Be case could be attributed to transfer and/or break-up events.