Weak e+e- lines from internal pair conversion observed in collisions of 238U with heavy nuclei

TL;DR

This study observes internal pair conversion (IPC) e+e- pairs in uranium-heavy nucleus collisions near the Coulomb barrier, confirming theoretical predictions and demonstrating dependence on collision parameters.

Contribution

First experimental observation of IPC e+e- pairs from specific nuclear transitions in uranium-heavy nucleus collisions near the Coulomb barrier.

Findings

Weak e+e- lines match expected energies from gamma spectra

Cross sections align with excitation and IPC coefficients

Transfer cross sections depend strongly on collision proximity

Abstract

We present the results of a Doppler-shift correction to the measured e+e- sum-energy spectra obtained from e+e- coincidence measurements in 238U + 206Pb and 238U + 181Ta collisions at beam energies close to the Coulomb barrier, using an improved experimental setup at the double-Orange spectrometer of GSI. Internal-Pair-Conversion (IPC) e+e- pairs from discrete nuclear transitions of a moving emitter have been observed following Coulomb excitation of the 1.844 MeV (E1) transition in 206Pb and neutron transfer to the 1.770 MeV (M1) transition in 207Pb. In the collision system 238U + 181Ta, IPC transitions were observed from the Ta-like as well as from the U-like nuclei. In all systems the Doppler-shift corrected e+e- sum-energy spectra show weak lines at the energies expected from the corresponding $\gamma$-ray spectra with cross sections being consistent with the measured excitation cross sections of the $\gamma$ lines and the theoretically predicted IPC coefficients. No other than IPC e+e- sum-energy lines were found in the measured spectra. The transfer cross sections show a strong dependence on the distance of closest approach (R_min), thus signaling also a strong dependence on the bombarding energy close to the Coulomb barrier.