The impact of isospin dependence of pairing on fission barriers in the fission cycling regions

TL;DR

This paper investigates how the isospin dependence of pairing interactions influences fission barriers in actinides and superheavy nuclei, with implications for r-process nucleosynthesis modeling.

Contribution

It introduces the first systematic analysis of the isospin dependence of pairing effects on fission barriers using covariant density functional theory.

Findings

Isospin dependence of pairing significantly affects fission barrier heights.

Systematic uncertainties in fission barrier predictions are identified.

New insights into fission cycling regions relevant for r-process are provided.

Abstract

A systematic analysis of the ground state and fission properties of actinides and superheavy nuclei important for the $r$ process modeling has been performed within the framework of covariant density functional theory for the first time in Ref. [1]. A brief review of the results related to the heights of primary fission barriers and systematic uncertainties in their prediction is presented. In addition, new results on the potential impact of the isospin dependence of pairing on fission barriers in fission cycling regions is provided for the first time.