Inorganic Chemistry, Vol.38, No.4, 622-632, 1999
Floating bands in nuclear spectroscopy
The methods of heavy ion nuclear reaction spectroscopy are discussed. When combined with large gamma ray arrays and charged particle selection methods, vast amounts of nuclear data are collected and complex nuclear level schemes approaching the extremes of angular momentum result. Often, bands of levels associated with particular nuclei cannot be specifically tied down in the nucleus. Examples of these floating bands are given for Pm-135 and Dy-152. A correlation of the level schemes of Ra-219, observed in Th-223 alpha decay and the nuclear reaction Pb-208(C-14,3n), suggests that the ground state of Ra-219 has not been observed in the nuclear reaction study. The resultant levels in Ra-219 are then interpreted in terms of a reflection asymmetric nuclear model.