Elastic scattering measurement for the system 17O + 58Ni at Coulomb barrier energies with silicon strip detectors exploiting ASIC electronics

The quasi elastic scattering of a 17O projectile from a 58Ni target has been studied at beam energies ranging from 42.5 to 55.0 MeV in 2.5 MeV steps. The total reaction cross sections were derived from the measured angular distributions by using an optical model fit within the coupled-channel code FRESCO. These cross sections are very similar to those measured for 17F (loosely bound by 0.6 MeV), mirror nucleus of 17O (tightly bound by 4.14 MeV). This outcome points out that, in this energy range, the small binding energy of the 17F valence proton has negligible influence onto the reactivity of such a loosely bound projectile, contrary to simple expectations, and to what observed for other loosely bound nuclei. The reaction dynamics seems to be influenced mainly by the Coulomb interaction which is similar for both mirror projectiles.