ANGULAR-MOMENTUM DISTRIBUTIONS FOR O-16+ND-144

Fusion cross sections have been measured for the system O-16 + Nd-144 at bombarding energies in the range 67 MeV less-than-or-equal-to E(lab) less-than-or-equal-to 90 MeV by detecting directly evaporation residues in Si detectors and in the range 60 MeV less-than-or-equal-to E(lab) less-than-or-equal-to 75 MeV by off-line detection of the K x rays emitted by the radioactive evaporation residues and daughters. In order to obtain the spin distributions in the compound system gamma-ray multiplicity distributions for the most important neutron evaporation channels were also measured using a 4pi BaF2 array, in conjunction with Ge detectors. Results are compared with calculations based on models that consider fluctuations in barrier height due to ground-state zero-point vibrations as well as couplings to various inelastic and transfer channels.