Cluster emission, transfer and capture in nuclear reactions

Many nuclear reactions involve the emission or capture of clusters of nucleons such as deuterons, tritons, helions and α particles as well as nucleons, and these cluster reactions are of particular interest for the study of nuclear structure and nuclear reaction mechanisms. They provide important information on the single particle and on the multiparticle character of nuclear states, and so have been widely used as powerful nuclear spectroscopic tools. The mechanisms of cluster reactions show special features such as the competition between pickup and knockout processes and the contributions of several successive steps in the reaction. The inverse cluster capture reactions and the transfer reactions provide similar information.