Selective decay from a candidate of the σ-bond linear-chain state in ¹⁴C

A cluster-transfer experiment $^9$Be($^9$Be,$^{14}$C$^*\rightarrow\alpha$+$^{10}$Be)$\alpha$ was carried out using an incident beam energy of 45 MeV. This reaction channel has a large $Q$-value that favors populating the high-lying states in $^{14}$C and separating various reaction channels. A number of resonant states are reconstructed from the forward emitting $^{10}$Be + $\alpha$ fragments with respect to three sets of well discriminated final states in $^{10}$Be, most of which agree with the previous observations. A state at 22.5(1) MeV in $^{14}$C is found to decay predominantly into the states around 6 MeV in $^{10}$Be daughter nucleus, in line with the unique property of the predicted band head of the $\sigma$-bond linear-chain molecular states. A new state at 23.5(1) MeV is identified which decays strongly into the first excited state of $^{10}$Be.