The adequacy of using smoothly joined parabolic segments to parametrize the multihumped fission barriers has been tested by examining its simultaneous consistency with the three relevant fission observables, namely, the near-barrier fission cross sections, isomeric half-lives, and the ground-state spontaneous fission half-lives of a wide variety of a total of 25 actinide nuclides. The penetrabilities through such multihumped fission barriers have been calculated in the Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin approximation, and the various fission half-lives have been determined using the formalism given earlier by Nix and Walker. The results of our systematic analysis of these actinide nuclides suggest that such a parametrization is quite adequate at least for the even-even nuclei, as it reproduces satisfactorily their various observed fission characteristics. Major difficulties remain, however, for the odd mass and for the doubly odd nuclei where the calculated ground-state spontaneous fission half-lives are found to be several orders of magnitude larger than those measured. Possible reasons for such discrepancies are discussed. Fission branching ratios of the decay of the shape isomers in various actinide nuclides have also been calculated and are compared with their measured values.

• Received 17 February 1989

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevC.42.1443