Fission fragments mass distributions of nuclei populated by the multinucleon transfer channels of the 18O + 232Th reaction

Abstract It is shown that the multinucleon transfer reactions is a powerful tool to study fission of exotic neutron-rich actinide nuclei, which cannot be accessed by particle-capture or heavy-ion fusion reactions. In this work, multinucleon transfer channels of the 18 O +  232 Th reaction are used to study fission of fourteen nuclei 231,232,233,234 Th, 232,233,234,235,236 Pa, and 234,235,236,237,238 U. Identification of fissioning nuclei and of their excitation energy is performed on an event-by-event basis, through the measurement of outgoing ejectile particle in coincidence with fission fragments. Fission fragment mass distributions are measured for each transfer channel, in selected bins of excitation energy. In particular, the mass distributions of 231,234 Th and 234,235,236 Pa are measured for the first time. Predominantly asymmetric fission is observed at low excitation energies for all studied cases, with a gradual increase of the symmetric mode towards higher excitation energy. The experimental distributions are found to be in general agreement with predictions of the fluctuation–dissipation model.