On disintegration of highly excited nuclei

Dissipative Collisions at incident energies of 20 MeV/u lead to excitation energies in the intermediate system of up to 4 MeV/u with corresponding temperatures of more than 6 MeV. The highly excited emerging fragments display a variety of decay patterns such as emission of light particles, more complex fragments or fission. The ratio of two-body to three-body channels (two and three heavy ejectiles, respectively) has been investigated in Mo + Mo reactions at energies between 12 and 19 MeV/u. At total kinetic energy losses larger than 500 MeV the three-body channel is stronger than the two-body channel. For a given loss in total kinetic energy the intensity ratio of the two channels is independent of the bombarding energy. In the decay by light charged particles non-sequential components are clearly identified, which allows to establish a rough time scale of the emission