[en] The role of beyond-mean-field correlations from the restoration of broken symmetries and configuration mixing for the description of superheavy elements is illustrated.

[en] In case of rare decay events the lifetime or the decay width is evaluated with low statistics. The uncertainty has to be carefully evaluated. In this article, we propose a Bayesian analysis of the lifetime and decay width and derive simple formulas for their assigned values and for the limits of the credible interval. The results are applied to the decay of superheavy nuclei as an illustration.

[en] The great chemist Glenn Seaborg has written a delightful little book “Man-made Transuranium Elements”, published in 1963, in which he points out that: “The former basic criterion for the discovery of a new element – namely, chemical identification and separation from all previously-known elements – had to be changed in the case of lawrencium (element 103). This also may be true for elements beyond lawrencium.” Indeed this is what has happened. The elements with Z ≥ 103 are produced in nuclear reactions and are detected by counters. The detectors have undergone substantial refinement. For example one uses multiwire proportional chambers [for which George Charpak received the 1992 Nobel Prize in Physics] as well as solid state micro-strip detectors. In spite of this remarkable shift from chemistry to physics, the managerial staff of the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) does not seem to be aware of what has been going on. The validation of superheavy elements should be done by physicists as the chemists lack the relevant competence as I will discuss here below. This article is about a collaboration between International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) and its sister organization International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP), to deal with discovery of superheavy elements beyond Z = 112. I spent a great deal of time on this issue. In my opinion, the collaboration turned out to be a failure. For the sake of science, which should be our most important concern (and not politics), the rules for the future collaborations, if any, should be accurately defined and respected. The validation of new elements should be done by people who have the relevant competence – the physicists.

[en] Superheavy elements are created in the laboratory by the fusion of two heavy nuclei. The large Coulomb repulsion that makes superheavy elements decay also makes the fusion process that forms them very unlikely. Instead, after sticking together for a short time, the two nuclei usually come apart, in a process called quasifission. Mass-angle distributions give the most direct information on the characteristics and time scales of quasifission. A systematic study of carefully chosen mass-angle distributions has provided information on the global trends of quasifission. Large deviations from these systematics reveal the major role played by the nuclear structure of the two colliding nuclei in determining the reaction outcome, and thus implicitly in hindering or favouring superheavy element production.

[en] After more than 45 years of successful operation of the GSI velocity filter SHIP in heavy and superheavy element research, it is time for the development of a next-generation in-flight separator. In frame of our Manipal-GSI-Giessen collaboration we designed a velocity filter which is intended for (super)heavy fusion and multinucleon transfer products. In this article we will present the design of the new in-flight separator and related detection techniques, as well as further activities of our collaboration.

[en] A breakthrough in the struggle to understand the synthesis and shape of superheavy elements was made recently at the Argonne National Laboratory near Chicago in the US. An international team of nuclear physicists from the US, France, Finland, Norway and the UK has reported that one very heavy nucleus, nobelium-254, can be remarkably stable, even when it is created in a ''high-spin'' state (P Reiter et al. 1999 Phys. Rev. Lett. 82 509). The publication comes amid reports of the discovery of an element with 114 protons at the JINR laboratory in Dubna, Russia. If confirmed, this will be the heaviest element yet created. (UK)

[en] Fusion – fission probabilities in the synthesis of heaviest elements are discussed in the context of the latest experimental reports. Cross sections for superheavy nuclei are evaluated using the “Fusion by Diffusion” (FBD) model. Predictive power of this approach is shown for experimentally known Lv and Og isotopes and predictions given for Z = 119, 120. Ground state and saddle point properties as masses, shell corrections, pairing energies, and deformations necessary for cross-section estimations are calculated systematically within the multidimensional microscopic-macroscopic method based on the deformed Woods-Saxon single-particle potential. In the frame of the FBD approach predictions for production of elements heavier than Z = 118 are not too optimistic. For this reason, and because of high instability of superheavy nuclei, we comment on some structure effects, connected with the K-isomerism phenomenon which could lead to a significant increase in the stability of these systems.

[en] The process of spontaneous or induced fission, by which an atomic nucleus breaks into two or more fragments, presents, more than eight decades after its discovery, a very interesting research topic in the field of low- and medium-energy nuclear physics. From a modern perspective, nuclear fission can be considered a representative example of large-amplitude collective motion in a self-bound mesoscopic system, that exhibits both classical and quantal characteristics. In addition to important technological applications, primarily in energy production, fission is also relevant for the stability of superheavy elements, production of short-lived exotic nuclides far from stability, nuclear astrophysics, and the mechanism of nucleosynthesis.

[en] Studies of the superheavy elements bring several challenges through low production yields, short half-lives, and high background rates. This paper describes the possibilities of chemical separations as techniques to overcome the background problematic and to investigate the nuclear properties of the heaviest nuclides.

[en] An international commission set up by IUPAP and IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Physics/ Chemistry) in 1987 and chaired by Sir Denys Wilkinson has published its findings on the status of the transfermium elements (beyond atomic number 100) and the credit for the various discoveries