Two-parameter liquid drop describing symmetric fission

A two-parameter liquid drop model has been proposed to describe the symmetric fission process by using generalized Cassinian ovals as the function family of nuclear surface shapes. The saddle-point shapes and other properties have been calculated over a wide range of the fissility parameter x and compared with those using other methods. The agreement is surprisingly good. With the aid of an adiabatic approximation, the scission-point configurations for 0.3<x<0.67 have been determined, and the mutual potential energies at the scission point were calculated and are consistent with the experimental data for the most probable value of the total fission-fragment kinetic energy. The simple model has been extended to asymmetric systems, and, therefore, can be used in dynamical calculations for nuclear systems with large deformation.