Systematics of threshold incident energy for deep sub-barrier fusion hindrance

Abstract

We systematically evaluate the potential energy at the touching configuration for heavy-ion reactions using various potential models. We point out that the energy at the touching point, especially that estimated with the Krappe-Nix-Sierk (KNS) potential, strongly correlates with the threshold incident energy for steep falloff of fusion cross sections observed recently for several systems at extremely low energies. This clearly indicates that the steep fall-off phenomenon can be attributed to the dynamics after the target and projectile touch with each other, e.g., the tunneling process and the nuclear saturation property in the overlap region.