  Effect of deformation on half-life of two-proton (2p) radioactivity is
investigated across the periodic chart for nuclei with Z$<$82. 2p-decay
half-lives are estimated by employing our newly proposed semi-empirical formula
wherein the nuclear deformation has been incorporated in a phenomenological
way. Robustness of the formula is demonstrated as it estimates the measured
values quite accurately and, hence, reliably applied to predict the other
possible 2p-emitters. For many proton rich nuclei for which experimental data
on the decay energies are not available, we have used the theoretical values
obtained from our calculations using the relativistic mean-field (RMF)
approach. The uncertainties in the theoretical decay energy values are
minimised by machine learning (ML) technique. Correlation of 2p-radioactivity
with 2p-halo and deformation is probed. Our calculations show the phenomenon of
shape coexistence in several 2p-emitters, wherein the prolate shape is found to
be more predominant for the ground state.
