Sequential fissions of heavy nuclear systems

In Xe+Sn central collisions from 12 to 20 MeV/A measured with the INDRA 4$\pi$ multidetector, the three-fragment exit channel occurs with a significant cross section. In this contribution, we show that these fragments arise from two successive binary splittings of a heavy composite system. Strong Coulomb proximity effects are observed in the three-fragment final state. By comparison with Coulomb trajectory calculations, we show that the time scale between the consecutive break-ups decreases with increasing bombarding energy, becoming compatible with quasi-simultaneous multifragmentation above 18 MeV/A.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figures, contribution to conference proceedings of the Fifth International Workshop on Nuclear fission and Fission-Product Spectroscop

What young people want from health-related online resources: a focus group study

The growth of the Internet as an information source about health, particularly amongst young people, is well established. The aim of this study was to explore young people's perceptions and experiences of engaging with health-related online content, particularly through social media websites. Between February and July 2011 nine focus groups were facilitated across Scotland with young people aged between 14 and 18 years. Health-related user-generated content seems to be appreciated by young people as a useful, if not always trustworthy, source of accounts of other people's experiences. The reliability and quality of both user-generated content and official factual content about health appear to be concerns for young people, and they employ specialised strategies for negotiating both areas of the online environment. Young people's engagement with health online is a dynamic area for research. Their perceptions and experiences of health-related content seem based on their wider familiarity with the online environment and, as the online environment develops, so too do young people's strategies and conventions for accessing it

Δ\Delta-scaling and Information Entropy in Ultra-Relativistic Nucleus-Nucleus Collisions

The $\Delta$-scaling method has been applied to ultra-relativistic p+p, C+C and Pb+Pb collision data simulated using a high energy Monte Carlo package, LUCIAE 3.0. The $\Delta$-scaling is found to be valid for some physical variables, such as charged particle multiplicity, strange particle multiplicity and number of binary nucleon-nucleon collisions from these simulated nucleus-nucleus collisions over an extended energy ranging from $E_{lab}$ = 20 to 200 A GeV. In addition we derived information entropy from the multiplicity distribution as a function of beam energy for these collisions.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, 1 table; to appear in the July Issue of Chin. Phys. Lett.. Web Page: http://www.iop.org/EJ/journal/CP

Yield scaling, size hierarchy and fluctuations of observables in fragmentation of excited heavy nuclei

Multifragmentation properties measured with INDRA are studied for single sources produced in Xe+Sn reactions in the incident energy range 32-50 A MeV and quasiprojectiles from Au+Au collisions at 80 A MeV. A comparison for both types of sources is presented concerning Fisher scaling, Zipf law, fragment size and fluctuation observables. A Fisher scaling is observed for all the data. The pseudo-critical energies extracted from the Fisher scaling are consistent between Xe+Sn central collisions and Au quasi-projectiles. In the latter case it also corresponds to the energy region at which fluctuations are maximal. The critical energies deduced from the Zipf analysis are higher than those from the Fisher analysis.Comment: 30 pages, accepted for publication in Nuclear Physics A, references correcte

Transition from participant to spectator fragmentation in Au+Au reaction between 60 AMeV and 150 AMeV

Using the quantum molecular dynamics approach, we analyze the results of the recent INDRA Au+Au experiments at GSI in the energy range between 60 AMeV and 150 AMeV. It turns out that in this energy region the transition toward a participant-spectator scenario takes place. The large Au+Au system displays in the simulations as in the experiment simultaneously dynamical and statistical behavior which we analyze in detail: The composition of fragments close to midrapidity follows statistical laws and the system shows bi-modality, i.e. a sudden transition between different fragmentation pattern as a function of the centrality as expected for a phase transition. The fragment spectra at small and large rapidities, on the other hand, are determined by dynamics and the system as a whole does not come to equilibrium, an observation which is confirmed by FOPI experiments for the same system.Comment: published versio

Gross Properties and Isotopic Phenomena in Spectator Fragmentation

A systematic study of isotopic effects in the break-up of projectile spectators at relativistic energies has been performed with the ALADiN spectrometer at the GSI laboratory. Searching for signals of criticality in the fragment production we have applied the model independent universal fluctuations theory already proposed to track criticality signals in multifragmentation to our data. The fluctuation of the largest fragment charge and of the asymmetry of the two and three largest fragments and their bimodal distribution have also been analysed.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, IX International Conference on Nucleus-Nucleus Collisions, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, August 28 - September 1, 200

Coulomb chronometry to probe the decay mechanism of hot nuclei

In 129 Xe+ nat Sn central collisions from 8 to 25 MeV/A, the three-fragment exit channel occurs with a significant cross section. We show that these fragments arise from two successive binary splittings of a heavy composite system. The sequence of fragment production is determined. Strong Coulomb proximity effects are observed in the three-fragment final state. A comparison with Coulomb trajec-tory calculations shows that the time scale between the consecutive break-ups decreases with increasing bombarding energy, becoming quasi-simultaneous above excitation energy E * = 4.0$\pm$0.5 MeV/A. This transition from sequential to simultaneous break-up was interpreted as the signature of the onset of multifragmentation for the three-fragment exit channel in this system.Comment: 12 pages; 13 Figures; 4 Table; Accepted for publication in Physical Review

Bimodality - a general feature of heavy ion reactions

Recently, is has been observed that events with the {\it same} total transverse energy of light charged particles (LCP) in the quasi target region, $E_{\perp 12}^{QT}$, show two quite distinct reaction scenarios in the projectile domain: multifragmentation and residue production. This phenomenon has been dubbed "bimodality". Using Quantum Molecular Dynamics calculations we demonstrate that this observation is very general. It appears in collisions of all symmetric systems larger than Ca and at beam energies between 50 A.MeV and 600 A.MeV and is due to large fluctuations of the impact parameter for a given $E_{\perp 12}^{QT}$. Investigating in detail the $E_{\perp 12}^{QT}$ bin in which both scenarios are present, we find that neither the average fragment momenta nor the average transverse and longitudinal energies of fragments show the behavior expected from a system in statistical equilibrium, in experiment as well as in QMD simulations. On the contrary, the experimental as well as the theoretical results point towards a fast process. This observation questions the conjecture that the observed bimodality is due to the coexistence of 2 phases at a given temperature in finite systems.Comment: accepted PR

Neutron recognition in the LAND detector for large neutron multiplicity

The performance of the LAND neutron detector is studied. Using an event-mixing technique based on one-neutron data obtained in the S107 experiment at the GSI laboratory, we test the efficiency of various analytic tools used to determine the multiplicity and kinematic properties of detected neutrons. A new algorithm developed recently for recognizing neutron showers from spectator decays in the ALADIN experiment S254 is described in detail. Its performance is assessed in comparison with other methods. The properties of the observed neutron events are used to estimate the detection efficiency of LAND in this experiment.Comment: 16 pages, 8 figure