Differences in Fission Product Yield
A graph of fission product yield against the mass number of the fission fragments has two pronounced but fairly flat peaks, at around 90 to 100, and 130 to 140. With thermal neutrons, yields of fission products with mass between the peaks, such as Cd-113m, Sn-119m, Sn-121m, Sn-123, Sb-125, Sn-126, and Sb-127 are very low.
The higher the energy of the state that undergoes nuclear fission, the more likely a symmetric fission is, hence as the neutron energy increases and/or the energy of the fissioning atom increases, the valley between the two peaks becomes more shallow; for instance, the curve of yield against mass for Pu-239 has a more shallow valley than that observed for U-235, when the neutrons are thermal neutrons. The curves for the fission of the later actinides tend to make even more shallow valleys. In extreme cases such as 259Fm, only one peak is seen.
Read more about this topic: Fast Fission
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