U.S.-Mexico Collaborative Research: Sub-Barrier Fusion of Heavy Ions

该奖项将支持圣母大学的James Kolata教授与墨西哥国家核研究所（ININ）的Eli Aguilera博士和Jaime Vega博士之间的合作研究。这项研究的目标是对重离子聚变有一个基本的了解。由于原子核因其电荷而相互强烈排斥，因此有必要向系统提供大量的能量，使它们的表面接触，以便聚变能够进行。然而，即使表面不接触，聚变也可以通过一种被称为“量子力学隧道”的过程来完成，这是几种现代电子设备的基础。在核的情况下，这个过程的简单理论模型并不能完全预测这种“亚屏障”聚变所实现的强增强。人们提出了几种复杂的、通常相互矛盾的解释来解释这一现象，但需要进一步研究来理解这些影响。所提出的工作引起了当前的高度关注，因为它代表了一种研究内部自由度对量子力学隧穿过程影响的重要方法。拟议的合作是以往努力的延伸，与两所院校的优势和设施非常匹配。详细的实验测量将在巴黎圣母院进行，而漫长的数据分析阶段将在ININ进行，使用该研究所强大的新计算机系统。这项工作很可能对重离子物理学领域作出贡献。

This award will support collaborative research between Prof. James Kolata of the University of Notre Dame and Dr. Eli Aguilera and Dr. Jaime Vega of the Mexican National Institute for Nuclear Research (ININ). The goal of the research is to achieve a basic understanding of heavy-ion fusion. Since atomic nuclei repel each other strongly due to their electric charge, it is therefore necessary to supply a substantial amount of energy to the system to make their surfaces come into contact so that fusion can proceed. However, even if the surfaces do not touch, fusion may be accomplished through a process known as "quantum-mechanical tunneling", which forms the basis of several modern electronic devices. In the nuclear case, simple theoretical models of the process do not quite predict the strong enhancement accomplished by this "sub-barrier" fusion. Several complicated and generally mutually incompatible explanations have been formulated to explain this phenomenon but further study is needed to understand these effects. The proposed work is of high current interest because it represents an important way in which the effect of internal degrees of freeedom on the quantum-mechanical tunneling process can be studied. The proposed collaboration is an extension of previous efforts and is well matched to the strengths and facilities at both institutions. Detailed experimental measurements will be carried out at Notre Dame while the lengthy data-analysis phase of the work will be done at ININ using a powerful new computer system at that institute. The proposed work is likely to make a contribution to the field of heavy ion physics.