Fusion of spherical-octupole pairs of colliding nuclei for compact and elongated configurations

The deformation and associated optimum/uniquely fixed orientations play an important role in the syn-thesis of compound nuclei via cold and hot fusion reactions,respectively,at the lowest and highest barrier energies.The choice of optimum orientation(0_(op))for the'cold or elongated'and hot or cormpact'fusion configurations of quadrupole(β_(2))deformed nuclei depends only on the+/-signs ofβ_(2)-deformation[J.Phys.G:Nucl.Part.Phys.31,631-644(2005)].In our recent study[Phys.Rev.C 101,051601(R)2020],we proposed a new sct of Oopt(iferent from the values reported for quadrupole deformed nuclei)after the inclusion of octupole deformation(up to B3)ef-fects.Using the respective 0op1 of B3-deformed nuclei for cold and hot optimum orientations,we analyzed the im-pact of the soft-and rigid-pear shapes of octupole deformed nuclei on the fusion barrier characterstics(barrier height Vg and barrier position RB).This analysis is applied to approximately 200 spherical-plus B3 deformed nucle-ar partners,that is,^(16)O,^(18)Cat octupole deformed nuclei.Compared with the compact configuration,the elongated fu-sion configuration has a relatively larger impact on the fusion barrier and cross sections ow ing to the inclusion of de-formations up to B3.Its agreement with available experimental data for the^(16)O+^(150)Sm reaction(β_(22)-0.205,β_(32)=0.055)also improves when the optimum orientation degree of freedom is fixed in view of octupole deformations.This reinforces the fact that nuclear structure effects play an important role in the nuclear fusion process.Thus,octu-pole deformed nuclei can be used for the synthesis of heavy and superheavy nuclei.