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Photodisintegration occurs when gamma rays split atomic nuclei, causing nuclear fission. It is important in supernovae and can cause the collapse of supermassive stars. The process has not been studied in a laboratory due to extreme energy requirements.
Photodisintegration is a physical process that occurs when gamma rays with massive energies strike an atomic nucleus and split it. Of the entire electromagnetic spectrum, gamma rays are the most energetic and also have the shortest wavelength, the size of an atomic nucleus or smaller.
Photodisintegration causes nuclear fission, the breaking up of atomic nuclei. This is the same mechanism that causes chain reactions in nuclear reactors and nuclear bombs. For elements lighter than iron, the reaction consumes energy and for elements heavier, it releases it. Elements lighter than iron require more energy to break than that released by that break. The energy generated by photodisintegration comes from the strong nuclear force that holds the particles together in the atomic nucleus.
The process of photodisintegration is an important factor in supernovae involving stars with 250 or more solar masses, such as the primordial Population III stars that were the first to illuminate the universe. In a collapsing supermassive star, the temperature at the core is so great that gamma rays capable of photodisintegration are produced. Because the vast majority of elements at the center of such a star are lighter than iron, the reaction absorbs energy, decreasing the pressure at the star’s center and causing it to collapse into a black hole.
At lower, but still extremely high energies, photodisintegration simply knocks one or two protons or neutrons out of the nucleus. At higher energies, the entire nucleus splits, but increasingly larger energies are required to split smaller nuclei.
Photodisintegration has not been studied by scientists in a laboratory setting because the energies required to initiate it are too extreme. Perhaps in the distant future we will build an experimental apparatus that will allow for a more in-depth study of photodisintegration, but until then the theoretical studies seem to be sufficient.
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