Speaker
Description
Over the past years, several sensitivity studies [1 - 4] have been performed in order to identify the uncertainties caused by the nuclear input in reaction networks aiming at describing the production of the $p$-nuclei. All studies indicated a strong dependence of the final abundance distribution of the heavy $p$-isotopes on the $\alpha$-nuclear potential, highlighting the strong need of characterising $\alpha$-particle induced reactions. Despite the astrophysical $p$-process, $\alpha$-particle induced reaction cross sections play an essential role under certain $r$-process conditions [5 - 7], and well as in the $\alpha$$p$-process [8].
Recent developments in target production [9,10] allow for the measurement of $\alpha$-particle induced reactions in inverse kinematics, opening a new window in the study of $\alpha$-nuclear interactions with exotic beams at low energies. Due to the lack of experimental data in the region around the heavy $p$-nuclei, uncertainties in the astrophysical modelling of the $p$-process are still dominated by the $\alpha$-nuclear potential. The use of radioactive beams in this mass region at energies around the Coulomb barrier surrounded by position-sensitive charged particle detectors provides an unique opportunity to validate models and to reduce the uncertainties in the nuclear potential, and consequently of the astrophysical modelling.
[1] T. Rauscher, Phys. Rev. C 73, 015804 (2006).
[2] W. Rapp, J. G\"orres, M. Wiescher, H. Schatz, and F. K\"appeler. Astrophys. J. 653, 474 (2006).
[3] T. Rauscher, N. Nishimura, R. Hirschi, G. Cescutti, A. St. J. Murphy, and A. Heger, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 463, 4153 (2016)
[4] A. Simon, M. Beard, B. S. Meyer, and B. Roach, J. Phys. G: Nucl. Part. Phys. 44, 064006 (2017)
[5] J. Bliss, A. Arcones, F. Montes, and J. Pereira, J. Phys. G: Nucl. Part. Phys. 44, 054003 (2017)
[6] P. Mohr, Phys. Rev. C 94, 035801 (2016)
[7] J. Pereira, and F. Montes, Phys. Rev C 93, 034611 (2016)
[8] A. M. Long, T. Adachi, M. Beard, {\it et al.}, Phys. Rev. C 95, 055803 (2017)
[9] R. Schierholz, B. Lacroix, V. Godinho, J. Caballero-Hern\'andez, M. Duchamp, and A. Fern\'andez, Nanotechnology 26, 075703 (2015).
[10] V. Godinho, F. J. Ferrer, B. Fern\'andez, J. Caballero-Hern\'andez, J. G\'omez-Camacho, and A. Fern\'andez. ACS Omega 2016, 1 (6), 1229 (2016).
