The SOFIA Experiment

SOFIA (Study On FIssion with Aladin) is an innovative experimental programme on nuclear fission carried out at GSI. In August 2012, we used relativistic secondary beams of neutron-deficient actinides and pre-actinides provided by the FRS and studied their fission, induced by electromagnetic interaction, in inverse kinematics. This experiment will provide for the first time complete isotopic yields (nuclear charge and mass) for both fragments over a broad range of fissioning nuclei from 238Np down to 183Hg. In this article, we discuss the experimental set-up and present promising preliminary results.