Nuclear rotational spectroscopy evidence

Aage Niels Bohr's 1975 lecture presents a plutonium ${}^{238}\mathrm{Pu}$ spectrum deduced from the fine structure of alpha decay of curium ${}^{242}\mathrm{Cm}$. The readout was decay-line energy; the comparison fixed the rotor scale from the first excitation and tested the remaining levels against $I(I+1)$. The lecture reports spectroscopy, rather than a laboratory setup operated by its author.^[ref]

His measured erbium ${}^{166}\mathrm{Er}$ $K=0$ band has excitation energies $0$, $80.56$, $265.0$, $545.4$ and $911.2\mathrm{keV}$ for $I=0,2,4,6,8$. The same lecture analyzes interband electric quadrupole transitions, adding tests beyond level positions.^[ref]

Using those first two excitations gives $265.0/80.56\simeq 3.28947$, close to the ideal $10/3$, and distinct from the ideal harmonic value $2$. Fixing the rotor scale with $80.56\mathrm{keV}$ predicts $268.53\mathrm{keV}$ at $I=4$ and $563.92\mathrm{keV}$ at $I=6$. The measured values lie about $1.32\%$ and $3.28\%$ below these predictions. This is a useful limit of the simple model: the pattern supports a rotational interpretation while revealing departures from constant inertia. It does not by itself determine a unique nuclear charge distribution. Reconstructing a level scheme also requires assigning which transitions connect which states; raw peak positions alone do not provide all spins, parities or transition strengths.