Nuclear Physics Nuclear Physics News is published on behalf of the Nuclear Physics European Collaboration Commit- tee (NuPECC), an Expert Committee of the Euro- pean Science Foundation, with colleagues from News Europe, America, and Asia. Volume 14/No. 4 Editor: Gabriele-Elisabeth Körner Editorial Board J. D’Auria, Vancouver W. Kutschera, Vienna R. F. Casten, Yale M. Leino, Jyväskylä T. W. Donnelly, MIT Cambridge R. Lovas, Debrecen A. Eir’o, Lisbon S. Nagamiya, Tsukuba M. Huyse, Leuven (Chairman) G. van der Steenhoven, Amsterdam Editorial Office: Physikdepartment, E12, Technische Universitat München, 85748 Garching, Germany, Tel: +49 89 2891 2293, +49 172 89 15011, Fax: +49 89 2891 2298, E-mail: [email protected] Correspondents Argentina: O. Civitaresse, La Plata; Australia: A. W. Thomas, Adelaide; Austria: H. Oberhummer, Vienna; Belgium: C. Angulo, Louvain-la-Neuve; Brasil: M. Hussein, Sao Paulo; Bulgaria: D. Balabanski, Sofia; Canada: J.-M. Poutissou, TRIUMF; K. Sharma, Manitoba; C. 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Petitjean, PSI Villigen; United Kingdom: B. F. Fulton, York; D. Branford, Edinburgh; USA: R. Janssens, Argonne; Ch. E. Reece, Jefferson Lab; B. Jacak, Stony Brook; B. Sherrill, Michigan State Univ.; H. G. Ritter, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory; S. E. Vigdor, Indiana Univ.; G. Miller, Seattle. Nuclear Physics News ISSN 1050-6896 Subscriptions Nuclear Physics News is supplied free of charge to Advertising Manager nuclear physicists from contributing countries upon Maureen M. Williams, P.O. Box 1547 request. In addition, the following subscriptions are Surprise, AZ 85378-1547, USA available: Tel: +1 623 544 1698 Fax: +1 623 544 1699 Volume 14(2004), 4 issues E-mail: [email protected] Personal: $57 USD, £35 GBP Institution: $461 USD, £279 GBP Circulation and Subscriptions Taylor & Francis Inc. 325 Chestnut Street 8th Floor Philadelphia, PA 19106, USA Tel: +1 215 625 8900 Fax: +1 215 625 8914 Copyright © 2004 Taylor & Francis Inc. Reproduction without permission is prohibited. All rights reserved. The opinions expressed in NPN are not necessarily those of the editors or publishers. Vol. 14, No. 4, 2004, Nuclear Physics News 1 Nuclear Physics Volume 14/No. 4 News Contents Editorial .............................................................................................................................................................. 3 Feature Article On the Discovery of Superheavy Elements by Sigurd Hofmann, Gottfried Münzenberg, and Matthias Schädel ............................................................... 4 Superheavy Element Chemistry by Andreas Türler and A. B. Yakushev.......................................................................................................... 14 Developments in Spectroscopic Studies of Deformed Superheavy Nuclei by P. A. Butler and M. Leino ......................................................................................................................... 23 Facilities and Methods Application of Low Energy Spin Polarized Radioactive Ion Beams in Condensed Matter Research by R. F. Kiefl, K. H. Chow, W. A. MacFarlane, C. D. P. Levy, and Z. Salman ............................................. 28 KEK-JAERI Joint RNB Facility, TRIAC by H. Miyatake and H. Ikezoe....................................................................................................................... 35 Meeting Reports International Workshop on Fundamental Interactions by Gerco Onderwater ................................................................................................................................... 39 News and Views................................................................................................................................................ 40 News from EPS/NPB IBA-Europhysics Prize 2004 for “Applied Nuclear Science and Nuclear Methods in Medicine” by Ch. Leclercq-Willain ................................................................................................................................ 41 Lise Meitner Prize for Nuclear Science 2004 by Ron C. Johnson ........................................................................................................................................ 41 Calendar ................................................................................................................................... Inside back cover Cover illustration: Upper end of the chart of nuclei showing the presently known nuclei in colors attributed to their decay mode: α decay yellow, β+ decay red, β− decay blue, spontaneous fission green, and γ decaying isomers white. Also given are the measured half-lives and α-decay chains observed in experiments. The background structure in blue color shows the calculated shell correction energy according to the macroscopic-microscopic model with minimum values of –7 MeV (darkest blue) for both deformed nuclei at Z = 108, N = 162 and spherical superheavy nuclei at Z = 114, N = 184. The intensity of the blue color is reduced with increasing shell correction energy in steps of 1 MeV. 2 Nuclear Physics News, Vol. 14, No. 4, 2004 editorial To Publish or Not to Publish in Proceedings? That is indeed the question that is thus easy to get all the numbers. journals belonging to a certain science on my mind when returning from a Companies, for example, ISI web of domain as defined by ISI. For example, workshop or a conference. This might knowledge, not only deliver these Nuclear Physics B is in the nuclear seem strange at first sight, but the results but also define the parameters physics category while Nuclear question is triggered by the fact that (impact factors, number of citations Instruments and Methods A is not. more and more conference proceedings versus world averages, etc.) and Secondly, there is a tendency to merge appear in regular scientific journals and categorize the journals in different nuclear physics and high-energy that lately new research evaluation research domains. The definition of the physics journals into one category. This criteria appear. One of the arguments parameters is out of control of the has led to the following situation. A few often used in favor of refereed research groups and evaluation years ago a study was performed where conference proceedings is that it gives committees tend to use criteria that research groups from different more possibilities for PhD students to sometimes do not make sense. European universities were compared become first author on a publication in Furthermore, when the evaluation deals on the basis of the average number of a refereed journal. This is a false with projects or candidates from citations per publication normalized to argument and in the long term the different research fields the measurable the average citation score of the tendency of publishing conference quantities gain more and more relevant science domain. The proceedings in regular journals will hurt importance. In the long term all of this conclusion was that the top group in the our field. will be devastating for our research domain of nuclear physics was from a Nowadays different criteria are used funding. Let me illustrate this with a university where no nuclear physics to evaluate research projects. These few examples. research was performed. After some evaluation processes are important not In our field there are no standard investigation it turned out that this the least for society that has the right to rules for the order of the author list group was excellent in high-energy know if the resources it invests in available and if they exist they physics, publishing frequently in fundamental research—even though definitely differ from rules or habits in Nuclear Physics B. Another more they are scarce—are well spent. It is other fields of science. A recent practice recent example stems from an however difficult to measure the quality at our university requests that new evaluation round whereby groups from of fundamental research projects as its PhD’s have to have at least three different research fields were real quality can often only be judged publications as first author in compared. The parameter used was the after a long time. A way out, that has international journals in order to be number of publications in the “top become common practice, is to eligible for a post-doc grant. journals” of a particular field; “top combine measurable quantities with Publications in conference proceedings journal” being defined as belonging to reports from peer reviewing, with are not accepted, even if they are the top 10% of the journals with