Kinetic energies of cluster fragments in ternary fission of 252 Cf

The kinetic energy distribution and potential energies of fragments from the collinear cluster tripartition (CCT), the ''true'' ternary fission of 252Cf, have been calculated. It is assumed that the breakup of the nucleus into three fragments happens sequentially in two steps from a hyper-deformed shape. In the first step a first neck rupture occurs of the parent radioactive nucleus, forming two fragments (one of them is usually 132Sn) and, in the second step, one of the two fragments breaks into two other fragments, resulting finally in three fragments (the experiment is based on a binary coincidence where a missing mass is determined). We show the result for the principal combination of the three spherical fragments (semi-magic isotopes of Sn, Ca, Ni) observed recently experimentally. These isotopes are clusters with high Q -values, which produce the highest yields in the ternary fission bump. It is shown that the kinetic energies of the middle fragments have very low values, making their experimental detection quite difficult. This fact explains why the direct detection of true ternary fission with three fragments heavier than A > 40 has escaped experimental observation. (orig.)