DoP Colloquium - Petar Marević

Splitting the Atom: Modern Theoretical Approaches to Nuclear Fission
(Petar Marević - Department of Physics, PMF, Zagreb)

Nuclear fission, the splitting of an atomic nucleus into fragments, was discovered over 85 years ago. Today, it lies at the heart of many important societal applications, from energy production to national security. Yet, perhaps surprisingly, a comprehensive understanding of the phenomenon is still lacking, and fission remains a very active frontier of research. In this talk, we will explore some of the key open problems in fission research and outline state-of-the-art theoretical models used to tackle them. We will particularly focus on the question of the angular momentum of fission fragments - an intriguing problem that has recently drawn substantial experimental and theoretical attention.