Role of noncollective excitations in low-energy heavy-ion reactions

We investigate the effect of single-particle excitations on heavy-ion reactions at energies near the Coulomb barrier. To this end, we describe single-particle degrees of freedom with the random matrix theory and solve the coupled-channels equations for one-dimensional systems. We find that the single-particle excitations hinder the penetrability at energies above the barrier, leading to a smeared barrier distribution. This indicates that the single-particle excitations provide a promising way to explain the difference in a quasielastic barrier distribution recently observed in Ne-20 + Zr-90,Zr-92 systems.