skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Discovery of fermium-259. [Half life, cross sections]

Conference ·
OSTI ID:7270019

A 1.5-sec spontaneous fission activity was produced by irradiation of /sup 257/Fm with 16-MeV tritons at the Los Alamos Tandem Van de Graaff Facility. On the basis of cross section and fission systematics, this 1.5-sec activity was attributed to /sup 259/Fm formed by the reaction, /sup 257/Fm(t,p)/sup 259/Fm. /sup 259/Fm is the heaviest known isotope of fermium and has more neutrons than any other isotope so far identified. The mass distribution of the /sup 259/Fm is highly symmetric and the average total kinetic energy is very high, 230 +- 2 MeV. These features continue the trend toward more symmetric mass distributions and higher total kinetic energies observed previously for the fermium isotopes as the number of neutrons is increased.

Research Organization:
Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
DOE Contract Number:
W-7405-ENG-36
OSTI ID:
7270019
Report Number(s):
LA-UR-76-1055; CONF-760560-2; TRN: 76-018611
Resource Relation:
Conference: 3. international conference on nuclides far from stability, Corsica, Italy, 19 May 1976
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English