articleNature PhysicsAug 22, 2022HYBRID OA

Ab initio predictions link the neutron skin of 208Pb to nuclear forces

TRIUMF · Chalmers University of Technology · +8 more institutions

PubMed
Indexed inarxivcrossrefpubmed

Abstract

Abstract Heavy atomic nuclei have an excess of neutrons over protons, which leads to the formation of a neutron skin whose thickness is sensitive to details of the nuclear force. This links atomic nuclei to properties of neutron stars, thereby relating objects that differ in size by orders of magnitude. The nucleus 208 Pb is of particular interest because it exhibits a simple structure and is experimentally accessible. However, computing such a heavy nucleus has been out of reach for ab initio theory. By combining advances in quantum many-body methods, statistical tools and emulator technology, we make quantitative predictions for the properties of 208 Pb starting from nuclear forces that are consistent with…

No related works found for this paper.

Funding