Eur. Phys. J. A (2006) 30: 183-202
https://doi.org/10.1140/epja/i2006-10116-7

Dynamics and Thermodynamics with Nuclear Degrees of Freedom

Evolution of the giant dipole resonance properties with excitation energy

¹ Laboratori Nazionali del Sud, INFN, Via S. Sofia 62, I-95123, Catania, Italy
² Institut de Physique Nucléaire, IN2P3-CNRS, F-91406, Orsay, France

^* e-mail: santonocito@lns.infn.it

Received: 7 March 2006
Accepted: 26 July 2006
Published online: 31 October 2006

Abstract

The studies of the evolution of the hot Giant Dipole Resonance (GDR) properties as a function of excitation energy are reviewed. The discussion will mainly focus on the A ∼ 100-120 mass region where a large amount of data concerning the width and the strength evolution with excitation energy are available. Models proposed to interpret the main features and trends of the experimental results will be presented and compared to the available data in order to extract a coherent scenario on the limits of the development of the collective motion in nuclei at high excitation energy. Experimental results on the GDR built in hot nuclei in the mass region A ∼ 60-70 will be also shown, allowing to investigate the mass dependence of the main GDR features. The comparison between limiting excitation energies for the collective motion and critical excitation energies extracted from caloric curve studies will suggest a possible link between the disappearance of collective motion and the liquid-gas phase transition.