Observation of fission modes in heavy ion induced reactions

The fission of the systems 220,224,226Th was investigated by measuring the mass-energy distributions of the fission fragments. The corresponding excitation energies at the saddle point, Esp*, ranged from 16 to 40 MeV. As Esp* decreases, an asymmetric mass component becomes visible on the predominately symmetric mass distribution. The contribution of the asymmetric mode is characterized by the total yield ratio Ys/Ya, which decreases rapidly for the heavier isotopes of thorium. This behavior of Ys/Ya is in qualitative agreement with theoretical calculations. For all isotopes studied, the subtracted asymmetric fission component, Ya=Y1-Ys, exhibits a complex structure, actually showing two components, Ya=Ya1+Ya0, which have average masses Ma1=132 and Ma0=140