Abstract
As laser–plasma interactions access ever-increasing ranges of plasma temperatures and densities, it is interesting to consider whether they will some day shed light on questions concerning nuclear synthesis. One such open question is the process of endothermic nuclear synthesis for elements with A > 60, thought to have taken place at a point in time during the big bang, or currently in supernovae. We present an explanation based on a Boltzmann equilibrium condition, in combination with the change of the Fermi-statistics from the relativistic branch for hadrons from higher than nuclear densities to the lower density subrelativistic branch. The Debye length confinement of nuclei breaks down at the relativistic change, thus leading to the impossibility of nucleation of the quark-gluon state at higher than nuclear densities. Taking the increment for the proton number Z as Z′ = 10 of the measured standard abundance distribution (SAD) of the elements for a Boltzmann probability for heavy element synthesis, a sequence 3n was found with the exponent n for the sequence of the magic numbers. The jump between the magic numbers 20 and 28 does not need then the usual spin-orbit explanation.
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Hora, H., Miley, G.H. & Osman, F. Boltzmann Equilibrium of Endothermic Heavy Nuclear Synthesis in the Universe and a Quark Relation to the Magic Numbers. Astrophys Space Sci 298, 247–253 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10509-005-3942-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10509-005-3942-0