Measurement of fusion cross sections for 16O+16O.

In earlier works, the fusion cross section for the ¹⁶O+¹⁶O reaction has been measured using different techniques. In the present work, we have obtained an experimental excitation function for ¹⁶O+¹⁶O using γ-ray spectroscopy. The measurements were performed at center-of-mass energies between 8.28 and 12.25 MeV. The theoretical predictions obtained with a coupled-channel model are consistent with the experimental data. From our analyses, the extrapolated S-factor value at 6.6 MeV, corresponding to the Gamow peak energy for core oxygen burning conditions, is about 3.6 × 10²⁵ MeV barn. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]