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Impact of tensor force on quantum shell effects in quasifission reactions

Quantum shell effects drive many aspects of many-body quantal systems and their interactions. Among these are the quasifission reactions that impede the formation of a compound nucleus in superheavy element (SHE) searches. Fragment production in quasifission is influenced by shell effects as a nontrivial manifestation of microscopic dynamics hindering the full equilibration of the composite system to form the compound nucleus. In this Letter, we use the microscopic time-dependent Hartree-Fock (TDHF) theory to study 48Ca+249Bk collisions to investigate the influence of the tensor component of the effective nucleon-nucleon interaction. The results show that the inclusion of the tensor force causes the spherical shell effect to become more prominent, particularly for the neutron number yield whose peak is exactly at magic number N = 126. This suggests that the tensor force plays a compelling role in the evolution of dynamical shell effects in nuclear reactions, influencing the competition between spherical and deformed shell gaps.