Investigating the Evolution of Multifragmenting Systems with Fragment Emission Order

W. A. Friedman Department of Physics, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin 53076 (Received 22 May 1996) Multifragment decays of central collisions in 84Kr 1 197Au at EyA ­ 70 MeV are studied. By utilizing a technique sensitive to the emission order of fragments, it is deduced that carbon fragments are emitted prior to beryllium fragments when these fragments have the same velocity. This observation is consistent with the cooling of a thermally decaying source. [S0031-9007(96)01726-7]