PHYS 560: Solution 5 George Newman December 8, 2006 Abstract ‘The solutions to the fifth assignment for Nuclear Physics, PHY560, Autumn 2006.1 Question 1: Wong 4.11 Obtain the masses of members of the A = 135 isobar from a table of binding energies and plot the results as a function of Z. From the results deduce the value of the symmetry binding energy parameter a, in the Weizacker mass formula.Carry out the same calcualtion for members of the A = 136 isobar and estimate the value of the pairing parameter 6 from the results. Solution 1. The included Mathematica code has been used to perform a fit to data obtained from the NIST website. The tables provided there were of masses, and binding energies were obtained from these - that’s the reverse of what the problem asks for, but mass data is more readily available. ‘The fit returns the coefficients in E, = aZ? + bZ +c. When we write out the Weizacker formula in terms of Z and A, 22-1) (A-22) Ep(A, Z) aA — a2 A%8 — a Q) late the coefficients of Z and Z?, we find that = A+) _ 4 = Faaay 7 19.9Mev @) ‘The values for both isobars agree at this level of accuracy. 2. We can estimate the value of 6 from the residuals of the fit to the A = 136 isobar, since all of these nuclei are either even-even or odd- odd. Averaging these residuals for our data gave 6 ~ 1.9MeV. 2 Question 2: Wong 4.12 ‘The Weizacker mass formula is useful to obtain global distribution of binding energies as a function of A, Z, and NV. Use this formula to show that the Quvalue, ie., kinetic energy released, in fission is positive only for heavy nuclei SolutionIn order for positive Q to be relaeased, we must have E, (products) > E,(parent). (3) ‘The Weizacker mass formula. divides the binding energy into contribu- tions that behave differently as Z, N, and A very. Below, I'll refer to these ‘components of Ey as the bulk (B), surface (5), coulomb (C), and symmetry (11), components. (There is a pairing component as well, but it will depend petiodically on A, so we should ignore it in answering this question.) The binding energy for a species is, BAZ) = B-S-C-1 ) BZ-1)_ (A-22) re aes, respectively. We will consider only a 1 — 2 fission process, since any m ore complicated process could be described as a progression of 1 — 2 events. ‘The first two terms depend only on A. For A= Ai + An, ABS + AY? > (Ar + Aa). (5) ‘Thus, we know (B—S)142 < (BS), +(B—S)2, and we always loose kinetic energy to surface tension when fission occurrs. If we want to get Q > 0 the other terms must. compensate for this loss. Specifically, [Cia — Cy — On] + [42 — Th ~ Mh] > [51 + S2 — Sts] (6) u = aA ~ a A% — a must be true for fission to be exothermic. Lets start by considering II. We can parametrize the proton and neutron content of the daughter species in terms of the parent by writing, Z; = 2Z, Zy = (1—2)Z and N, = yN, Nz = (1—y)N. In the simple case where x = y we can plug these values into the equation for IT in each species, and find that the symmetry energy is unchanged, no matter what the values of Z, N, and A are. Consider next the case where one of the daughter species is perfectly symmetric. In that case, (Mise - Th (7) ‘We can imagine going farther than this as well. If the parent has an excess of neutrons, consider putting all that difference and-then-some into one of 3