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In nuclear astrophysics, the rapid neutron-capture process, also known as the r-process, is a set of nuclear reactions that is responsible for the creation of approximately half of the atomic nuclei heavier than iron, the "heavy elements", with the other half produced by the p-process and s-process.
Heavy water (deuterium oxide, 2 H 2 O, D 2 O) is a form of water in which hydrogen atoms are all deuterium (2 H or D, also known as heavy hydrogen) rather than the common hydrogen-1 isotope (1 H, also called protium) that makes up most of the hydrogen in normal water. [3]
Creation of elements beyond carbon through alpha process. The alpha process, also known as alpha capture or the alpha ladder, is one of two classes of nuclear fusion reactions by which stars convert helium into heavier elements. The other class is a cycle of reactions called the triple-alpha process, which consumes only helium, and produces ...
Fusing with additional helium nuclei can create heavier elements in a chain of stellar nucleosynthesis known as the alpha process, but these reactions are only significant at higher temperatures and pressures than in cores undergoing the triple-alpha process.
Supernova nucleosynthesis is the nucleosynthesis of chemical elements in supernova explosions.. In sufficiently massive stars, the nucleosynthesis by fusion of lighter elements into heavier ones occurs during sequential hydrostatic burning processes called helium burning, carbon burning, oxygen burning, and silicon burning, in which the byproducts of one nuclear fuel become, after ...
Induced gamma emission belongs to a class in which only photons were involved in creating and destroying states of nuclear excitation. Fission reactions – a very heavy nucleus, after absorbing additional light particles (usually neutrons), splits into two or sometimes three pieces. This is an induced nuclear reaction.
In the past one has found that transmutations of nuclei only take place with the emission of electrons, protons, or helium nuclei, so that the heavy elements change their mass only a small amount to produce near neighbouring elements. When heavy nuclei are bombarded by neutrons, it is conceivable that the nucleus breaks up into several large ...
The release of energy with the fusion of light elements is due to the interplay of two opposing forces: the nuclear force, a manifestation of the strong interaction, which holds protons and neutrons tightly together in the atomic nucleus; and the Coulomb force, which causes positively charged protons in the nucleus to repel each other. [17]