Publication Date:
2012-08-11
Description:
Quantum-mechanical shell effects are expected to strongly enhance nuclear binding on an "island of stability" of superheavy elements. The predicted center at proton number Z = 114, 120, or 126 and neutron number N = 184 has been substantiated by the recent synthesis of new elements up to Z = 118. However, the location of the center and the extension of the island of stability remain vague. High-precision mass spectrometry allows the direct measurement of nuclear binding energies and thus the determination of the strength of shell effects. Here, we present such measurements for nobelium and lawrencium isotopes, which also pin down the deformed shell gap at N = 152.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Minaya Ramirez, E -- Ackermann, D -- Blaum, K -- Block, M -- Droese, C -- Dullmann, Ch E -- Dworschak, M -- Eibach, M -- Eliseev, S -- Haettner, E -- Herfurth, F -- Hessberger, F P -- Hofmann, S -- Ketelaer, J -- Marx, G -- Mazzocco, M -- Nesterenko, D -- Novikov, Yu N -- Plass, W R -- Rodriguez, D -- Scheidenberger, C -- Schweikhard, L -- Thirolf, P G -- Weber, C -- New York, N.Y. -- Science. 2012 Sep 7;337(6099):1207-10. doi: 10.1126/science.1225636. Epub 2012 Aug 9.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Helmholtz-Institut Mainz, 55099 Mainz, Germany.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22878498" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Print ISSN:
0036-8075
Electronic ISSN:
1095-9203
Topics:
Biology
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Chemistry and Pharmacology
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Computer Science
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
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Physics
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