Have superheavy elements been produced in nature?

2012/07/14 by I. Petermann, K. Langanke, G. Martínez-Pinedo +3 · 4 citations
Earth and Planetary Sciences · Physics and Astronomy · #Cluster decay #Cold Fusion and Nuclear Reactions #Cold fission #Fission #Long-lived fission product #Neutrino Physics Research #Neutron #Nuclear physics research studies #Spontaneous fission #Superheavy Elements #Yield (engineering) #nucl-th

paper · pdf · doi:10.1140/epja/i2012-12122-6

12 pages, 11 figures

arxiv created 2012/07/14 · openalex publication_date 2012/09/01 · arxiv updated 2015/06/05 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05

Abstract

We discuss the possibility whether superheavy elements can be produced in Nature by the astrophysical rapid neutron capture process. To this end we have performed fully dynamical network r-process calculations assuming an environment with neutron-to-seed ratio large enough to produce superheavy nuclei. Our calculations include two sets of nuclear masses and fission barriers and include all possible fission channels and the associated fission yield distributions. Our calculations produce superheavy nuclei with A ~ 300 that however decay on timescales of days.

Citations

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• Predicted cross-sections for photon-induced particle emission
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• Synthesis of the isotopes of elements 118 and 116 in theCf<mml:mprescripts/><mml:none/>249andCm<mml:mprescripts/><mml:none/>245+Ca<mml:mprescripts/><mml:none/>48fusion reactions

Cited by

• Search for naturally occurring seaborgium with radiopure 116 CdWO 4 crystal scintillators
• The r-Java 2.0 code: nuclear physics
• Extended periodic table [wikipedia]
• Island of stability [wikipedia]