STATISTICAL DESCRIPTION OF STRONGLY DAMPED BINARY YIELDS FROM THE SI-28-16 REACTION(O)

Experimental data on strongly energy-damped yields from the Si-28+O-16 reaction at E-c.m.=39.1 and 50.5 MeV are analyzed in the context of f ission from the Ti-44 compound system. Several features of this system , including the presence of resonantlike structures in the elastic- an d inelastic-scattering excitation functions, the observation of large cross sections for strongly damped yields, and the recognition that th ere are relatively few channels open for reactions involving the near- grazing partial waves, have been taken to infer a deep-inelastic as op posed to fission origin of the strongly damped yields. We test this cl aim by comparing the predictions of the transition-state model for fis sion to the experimental results. The statistical model is found to ad equately describe the experimental results at the higher energy. The f ully energy-damped inelastic yields at 39.1 MeV, however, are found to be far in excess of expectations based on the fission model. This res ult is in sharp contrast to what has been observed in the nearby Mg-24 +O-16 system.