The interaction of an E/A=70-MeV (7)Be beam with a Be target was used to populate levels in (6)Be following neutron knockout reactions. The three-body decay of the ground and first excited states into the α+p+p exit channel were detected in the High Resolution Array. Precise three-body correlations extracted from the experimental data allowed us to obtain insight into the mechanism of the three-body democratic decay. The correlation data are in good agreement with a three-cluster-model calculation and thus validate this theoretical approach over a broad energy range.

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8 C is found to decay to four protons and an α particle in two 2p emission steps. The correlations between the protons in the first step ( 8 C to 6 Be) exhibit a significant enhancement in the region of the decay phase space where the two protons have small relative energy, a region sometimes called the diproton region. The decay of the isobaric analog of 8 C in 8 B is also found to decay by 2p emission. This is the first case of isospin-allowed 2p decay between isobaric analog states.