Time features of delayed neutrons and partial emissive-fission cross sections for the neutron-induced fission of ~(232)Th nuclei in the energy range 3.2-17.9 MeV

摘要

The energy dependence of the relative abundances of delayed neutrons and the energy dependence of the half-lives of their precursors in the neutron-induced fission of ~(232)Th nuclei in the energy range 3.2-17.9 MeV were measured for the first time. A systematics of the time features of delayed neutrons is developed. This systematics makes it possible to estimate the half-life of delayed-neutron precursors as a function of the nucleonic composition of fissile nuclei by using a single parameter set for all nuclides. The energy dependence of the partial cross sections for emissive fission in the reaction ~(232)Th(n, f) was analyzed on the basis of data obtained for the relative abundances of delayed neutrons and the aforementioned half-lives and on the basis of the created systematics of the time features of delayed neutrons. It was shown experimentally for the first time that the decrease in the cross section after the reaction threshold in the fission of ~(232)Th nuclei (it has a pronounced first-chance plateau) is not an exclusion among the already studied uranium, plutonium, and curium isotopes and complies with theoretical predictions obtained for the respective nuclei with allowance for shell, superfluid, and collective effects in the nuclear-level density and with allowance for preequilibrium neutron emission.