Beta-delayed fission in the lead region

最近，在2008年，庆祝了1938年由奥托·哈恩和弗里茨·斯特拉斯曼发现的核裂变70周年。在这一发现之后的15年里，在核裂变及其应用方面取得了一些具有里程碑意义的进展，其中包括1942年第一个人造核反应堆的诞生，1945年第一颗原子弹的爆炸，1951年核反应堆的第一代电力。世界上第一个商业核电站，位于英国塞拉菲尔德的考尔德霍尔，于1956年投入使用。从那时起，核裂变及其应用在科学和我们的日常生活中无处不在。根据世界核协会的数据，在20世纪80年代，全球平均每17天就有一个新的核反应堆启动。2007年，全球14%的电力来自核电。截至2009年9月，在31个国家有436个核电机组在运行，净发电量约为370吉瓦，在15个国家有53个电厂在建设中，装机容量为47吉瓦。2009年，英国近五分之一的电力是由现有的19座核反应堆产生的。继英国政府2008年1月决定支持建设新的核电站之后，政府宣布计划到2017年在英国新建四座核电站。本标准拨款申请所述的计划涵盖核裂变研究，具有科学和面向社会的影响和推广。在基础研究中，我们研究计划的主要目标之一是更好地理解非常奇异的原子核的裂变过程和裂变特性。在这个项目中研究的特殊类型的核裂变——奇异的β -延迟裂变——被认为发生在天体物理的r-过程中，它负责产生宇宙中最重的元素。特别是，理论家们提出，β延迟裂变，连同自发的和中子诱导的裂变，是所谓的裂变循环和裂变终止r过程的原因，后者确立了自然界最重元素生产的极限。为了实现我们的目标，我们将利用三种互补的技术来结合带电粒子、裂变和伽马射线光谱学：质量分离器ISOLDE（欧洲核子研究中心，日内瓦，瑞士）、速度过滤器SHIP（德国达姆施塔特GSI）和日本原子能机构的裂变光谱仪（日本东海，日本）。从社会角度来看，鉴于英国政府在核电发展方面的新举措，未来几年将需要许多新的核工业专家。我们的项目除了进行纯粹的基础核裂变研究外，还将为年轻的研究生和博士后研究人员提供辐射和核裂变应用、探测器和技术，包括核废料管理方面急需的专业培训。

Recently, in the year 2008, the 70th anniversary of nuclear fission, which was discovered in 1938 by Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann, was celebrated. In the next 15 years since the discovery a few landmark developments in nuclear fission and its application have followed, including among others, the creation of the first man-made nuclear reactor in 1942, the first atomic bomb explosion (1945), the first generation of electricity by a nuclear reactor in 1951. The world's first commercial nuclear power station, Calder Hall in Sellafield, England was opened in 1956. Since then, the nuclear fission and its applications became omnipresent both in science and in our day-by-day life. According to the World Nuclear Association, globally during the 1980s one new nuclear reactor started up every 17 days on average. In the year 2007, 14% of the world's electricity came from nuclear power. As of September 2009 in 31 countries 436 nuclear power plant units with an electric net capacity of about 370 GW are in operation and 53 plants with an installed capacity of 47 GW are in 15 countries under construction. In the UK, in 2009, nearly one fifth of the electricity was generated by the existing 19 nuclear power reactors. Following the UK Government's January 2008 decision to support the building of new nuclear power stations, plans have been announced to open four new plants in the UK by 2017. The programme described in this Standard Grant application covers research into nuclear fission and has both scientific and society- oriented impact and outreach. In fundamental research, one of the main goals of our research programme is to achieve a better understanding of fission process and fission properties of very exotic nuclei. The specific type of the nuclear fission studied in this project - the exotic beta-delayed fission - is believed to occur in the astrophysical r-process, which is responsible for the production of the heaviest elements in Universe. In particular, the theorists suggest that the beta-delayed fission, together with the spontaneous and neutron-induced fission, is responsible for the so-called fission recycling and the r-process termination by fission, the latter establishing the limit for the heaviest elements production in Nature. To achieve our goals, we will exploit a combination of charged-particle, fission and gamma-ray spectroscopy by using three complementary techniques: the mass separator ISOLDE (CERN, Geneva, Switzerland), the velocity filter SHIP (GSI, Darmstadt, Germany) and the fission spectrometer of the Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA, Tokai, Japan). Society-wise, in view of the new initiatives on nuclear power development by the UK government, many new specialists in nuclear industry will be required in the coming years. Our project, apart of pure fundamental nuclear fission research, will also provide the much needed specialized training of the young post-graduate students and post-doctoral researchers in the radiation and nuclear fission applications, detectors and techniques, including the nuclear waste management.