Evidence for spinodal decomposition in nuclear multifragmentation

Phys Rev Lett. 2001 Apr 9;86(15):3252-5. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.86.3252.

Abstract

Multifragmentation of a "fused system" was observed for central collisions between 32 MeV/nucleon 129Xe and (nat)Sn. Most of the resulting charged products were well identified due to the high performances of the INDRA 4pi array. Experimental higher-order charge correlations for fragments show a weak but nonambiguous enhancement of events with nearly equal-sized fragments. Supported by dynamical calculations in which spinodal decomposition is simulated, this observed enhancement is interpreted as a "fossil" signal of spinodal instabilities in finite nuclear systems.