Neutrino-induced fission of neutron-rich nuclei

Abstract

We calculate neutrino-induced fission cross sections for selected nuclei with Z=84-92. We show that these reactions populate the daughter nucleus at excitation energies where shell effects are significantly washed out, effectively reducing the fission barrier. If the r-process occurs in the presence of a strong neutrino fluence, and electron neutrino average energies are sufficiently high, perhaps as a result of matter-enhanced neutrino flavor transformation, then neutrino-induced fission could lead to significant alteration in the r-process flow in slow outflow scenarios.

arXiv comment4 pages, three figures

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• Neutrino-driven wind simulations and nucleosynthesis of heavy elements
• r-Process Calculations and Galactic Chemical Evolution
• Surface Symmetry Energy of Nuclear Energy Density Functionals
• Neutrino-nucleus reactions and their role for supernova dynamics and nucleosynthesis
• $\beta$-delayed fission in $r$-process nucleosynthesis
• The Influence of Neutrinos on r-Process Nucleosynthesis in the Ejecta of Black Hole-Neutron Star Mergers
• Fission Cycling in a Supernova r-process
• Assessment of saddle-point-mass predictions for astrophysical applications
• Nuclear physics and astrophysics of the r-process
• Weak Interaction Rate Coulomb Corrections in Big Bang Nucleosynthesis
• Fission barriers in neutron-proton isospin plane for heavy neutron-rich nuclei
• Nuclear structure far from stability