Nature of the pygmy dipole resonance in Ce-140 studied in (alpha, alpha 'gamma) experiments

A concentration of electric-dipole excitations below the particle threshold, which is frequently denoted as the pygmy dipole resonance, has been studied in the semimagic nucleus Ce-140 in (alpha, alpha(')gamma) experiments at E-alpha=136 MeV. The technique of alpha-gamma coincidence experiments allows the separation of E1 excitations from states of other multipolarities in the same energy region and provides an excellent energy resolution to allow a detailed analysis for each state. The experimental results show that the PDR splits into two parts with different nuclear structure: one part which is excited in (alpha, alpha(')gamma) as well as (gamma, gamma(')) experiments and one part which is excited only in (gamma, gamma('))