Nuclear multifragmentation and phase transition for hot nuclei

TL;DR

This review summarizes fifteen years of progress in understanding nuclear multifragmentation and its connection to the liquid-gas phase transition in nuclei and nuclear matter.

Contribution

It synthesizes recent advances in the thermodynamics of phase transitions in finite nuclear systems and their experimental and theoretical implications.

Findings

Significant progress in understanding multifragmentation

Clarification of the nuclear liquid-gas phase transition

Enhanced theoretical models of nuclear thermodynamics

Abstract

This review article is focused on the tremendous progress realized during the last fifteen years in the understanding of multifragmentation and its relationship to the liquid-gas phase diagram of nuclei and nuclear matter. The explosion of the whole nucleus, early predicted by Bohr [N. Bohr, Nature 137 (1936) 351], is a very complex and rich subject which continues to fascinate nuclear physicists as well as theoreticians who extend the thermodynamics of phase transitions to finite systems.