Structure of exotic nuclei near and above 208Pb populated via deep-inelastic collisions

High-spin states have been studied in neutron-rich nuclei produced in deep-inelastic collisions between a pulsed beam of Pb ions and a U target. The structure of nuclei such as Hg, Pb and Bi has revealed new information on the couplings of single-particle states to each other and to the octupole-vibrational phonon, essential input to the nuclear shell model. In addition, the first observations of high-spin states in U, U and U are compared to recent results for neighbouring plutonium nuclei.