A STUDY OF PROTON-INDUCED NUCLEAR FRAGMENTATION IN THE THRESHOLD REGION: 1 TO 20 GEV

THOMAS CRAIG SANGSTER, Purdue University

Abstract

This thesis contains the details of the experimental set-up and final results of BNL E-778. The experimental objective was to study proton induced nuclear fragmentation using an internal gas jet target facility that was specifically designed for this experiment and installed in the AGS main ring. The fragment telescopes were designed to measure a broad range of fragment charge (2 to 14) and kinetic energy (5 to 100 MeV). Using a mixed gas target (1% or 3% Xe with H(,2)), normalized fragment production cross sections were obtained by separately measuring p-p elastic production from the H(,2) component. Fragment production cross sections are observed to rise dramatically ((TURN) x 10) for incident proton energies between 1 and 10 GeV, while above 10 GeV, fragment production appears to be independent of the incident proton energy. The measured differential cross sections (above 10 GeV) are found to agree (within 20%) with the differential cross sections measured during a previous internal target experiment (E-591) conducted at FNAL, where the lowest available proton energies were 50 GeV. The measured fragment kinetic energy spectra (above 10 GeV) are fit with a functional form motivated by the observation that fragment production in an excited nuclear system is consistent with a critical phenomenon (a liquid-gas phase transition). The failure of this functional form at the lowest available incident energies (below 10 GeV) is interpreted as the observation of an additional fragment production mechanism. Recent theoretical and experimental evidence for an asymmetric fission process (binary decay), is used to modify the original functional form for the two-component spectra. It is concluded that, in the threshold region, two fragment production mechanisms are observed. Although insufficient information is available to uniquely separate the two components, certain features of the asymmetric fission mechanism are identified. The observed p-nucleus systematics are also shown to be consistent with two-body kinematics. The fragment production process is seen to depend on the formation of a local 'moving source', a small region of extreme excitation energy emitted by the target nucleus prior to fragment formation. Observation of the moving source is seen as an indication that the target nucleus will undergo a multibody break-up (the liquid-gas phase transition).

Degree

Ph.D.

Subject Area

Nuclear physics

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