Toward the Discovery of New Elements: Production of Livermorium (π = 116) with 50 Ti
The 244 Pu β’(50 Ti ,π₯β’π)β’ 294βπ₯ Lv reaction was investigated at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratoryβs 88-Inch Cyclotron. The experiment was aimed at the production of a superheavy element with π β₯114 by irradiating an actinide target with a beam heavier than 48 Ca. Produced Lv ions were separated from the unwanted beam and nuclear reaction products using the Berkeley Gas-filled Separator and implanted into a newly commissioned focal-plane detector system. Two decay chains were observed and assigned to the decay of 290 Lv . The production cross section was measured to be π prod = 0.44($^{+0.58}_{β0.28}$) pb at a center-of-target center-of-mass energy of 220(3) MeV. Furthermore, this represents the first published measurement of the production of a superheavy element near the βisland of stability,β with a beam of 50 Ti and is an essential precursor in the pursuit of searching for new elements beyond π =118.