We investigate the recently discovered $\alpha$ decays of heavy and superheavy nuclei with $A=160–294$ by the cluster model of $\alpha$ decay. This covers the short-lifetime $\alpha$ decays of the nuclei near the proton-drip line, the decays of superheavy elements with $Z=106–118$, and the long-lifetime decay of the naturally occurring nuclide ${}^{180}\mathrm{W}$ [Danevich et al., Phys. Rev. C 67, 014310 (2003)]. It is found that the cluster model can well reproduce the new data of half-lives of these nuclei. For superheavy nuclei the cluster model, without introducing any additional adjustments, can reasonably reproduce the half-lives of many nuclei although substantial deviations between experimental half-lives and theoretical ones exist in a few cases in which there may be large errors in the experimental data for a single event. Some new $\alpha$ emitters in naturally occurring nuclides are predicted. Experiments to search the $\alpha$ radioactivity of ${}^{176,178}\mathrm{Hf}$ and of ${}^{149}\mathrm{Sm}$ are strongly recommended.

• Received 23 September 2003

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevC.69.024614