Ab initio calculations of the isotopic dependence of nuclear clustering

Abstract

Nuclear clustering describes the appearance of structures resembling smaller nuclei such as alpha particles (4He nuclei) within the interior of a larger nucleus. While clustering is important for several well-known examples, much remains to be discovered about the general nature of clustering in nuclei. In this letter we present lattice Monte Carlo calculations based on chiral effective field theory for the ground states of helium, beryllium, carbon, and oxygen isotopes. By computing model-independent measures that probe three- and four-nucleon correlations at short distances, we determine the shape of the alpha clusters and the entanglement of nucleons comprising each alpha cluster with the outside medium. We also introduce a new computational approach called the pinhole algorithm, which solves a long-standing deficiency of auxiliary-field Monte Carlo simulations in computing density correlations relative to the center of mass. We use the pinhole algorithm to determine the proton and neutron density distributions and the geometry of cluster correlations in 12C, 14C, and 16C. The structural similarities among the carbon isotopes suggest that 14C and 16C have excitations analogous to the well-known Hoyle state resonance in 12C.

Version to appear in Physical Review Letters. 5 + 12 pages (main + supplemental materials), 3 + 12 figures (main + supplemental materials)

References in corpus (12)

• Structure and rotations of the Hoyle state
• A nucleus-dependent valence-space approach to nuclear structure
• Dispersion analysis of the nucleon form factors including meson continua
• Structure of ${}^{78}$Ni from first principles computations
• Symmetry-guided large-scale shell-model theory
• Electromagnetic response of 12C: a first-principles calculation
• Ab initio calculation of the potential bubble nucleus ${}^{34}$Si
• Alpha particle clusters and their condensation in nuclear systems
• Nucleon localization and fragment formation in nuclear fission
• ${}^4\mathrm{He}$+$n$+$n$ continuum within an ab initio framework
• ${}^{12}$C properties with evolved chiral three-nucleon interactions
• Effective forces between quantum bound states

Cited by in corpus (46)

• Microscopic Clustering in Light Nuclei
• A Guided Tour of Ab Initio Nuclear Many-Body Theory
• Lattice QCD and Three-particle Decays of Resonances
• Eigenvector continuation with subspace learning
• Three-Nucleon Forces: Implementation and Applications to Atomic Nuclei and Dense Matter
• Essential elements for nuclear binding
• From bound states to the continuum
• Emergent geometry and duality in the carbon nucleus
• Ab initio nuclear thermodynamics
• ${}^{16}{\mathrm{O}}^{16}\mathrm{O}$ at RHIC and the LHC comparing $\alpha$ clustering vs substructure
• Neutron-proton scattering with lattice chiral effective field theory at next-to-next-to-next-to-leading order
• Perturbative quantum Monte Carlo method for nuclear physics
• Leveraging Machine Learning to Alleviate Hubbard Model Sign Problems
• Self-learning Emulators and Eigenvector Continuation
• Ab initio study of the beryllium isotopes ${}^7$Be to ${}^{12}$Be
• Clustering of Four-Component Unitary Fermions
• Relativistic chiral description of the ${}^1{S}_0$ nucleon-nucleon scattering
• Impurity Lattice Monte Carlo for Hypernuclei
• Structure Factors for Hot Neutron Matter from Ab Initio Lattice Simulations with High-Fidelity Chiral Interactions
• Three-body resonances in pionless effective field theory
• The Tjon Band in Nuclear Lattice Effective Field Theory
• Lattice Effective Field Theory Simulations of Nuclei
• Ab Initio Simulations of Light Nuclear Systems Using Eigenvector Continuation and Auxiliary Field Monte Carlo
• Directly probing existence of $\alpha$-cluster structure in ${}^{20}$Ne by relativistic heavy-ion collisions
• Scattering phase shifts and mixing angles for an arbitrary number of coupled channels on the lattice
• Medium-induced bosonic clusters in a Bose-Fermi mixture: Towards simulating cluster formations in neutron-rich matter
• Binding of the three-hadron $D{D}^{\ast }K$ system from the lattice effective field theory
• Sign-Problem-Free Nuclear Quantum Monte Carlo Simulation
• Perturbative quantum Monte Carlo calculation with high-fidelity nuclear forces
• Efficient few-body calculations in finite volume
• Perspectives on few-body cluster structures in exotic nuclei
• Glauber predictions for oxygen and neon collisions at energies available at the LHC
• Quantum Many-Body Calculations using Body-Centered Cubic Lattices
• Towards modeling cluster structure of ${}^8$Be with chiral interaction
• Lattice Improvement in Lattice Effective Field Theory
• Charge-dependent nucleon-nucleon interaction at N${}^3$LO in nuclear lattice effective field theory
• Investigating nuclear beta decay using lattice quantum Monte Carlo approach
• Ab initio study of the radii of oxygen isotopes
• Worldline Monte Carlo method for few body nuclear physics
• Ab initio informed 20Ne(p, p$\alpha$)16O reaction elucidates the emergence of alpha clustering from chiral potentials
• Report from the A.I. For Nuclear Physics Workshop
• Probing Nuclear Geometry through Multi-Particle Azimuthal Correlations and Rapidity-Even Dipolar Flow in ${}^{16}$O+${}^{16}$O Collisions
• Machine Learning Unveils the Power Law of Finite-Volume Energy Shifts
• Signature of a possible $\alpha$-cluster state in $N=Z$ doubly-magic ${}^{56}$Ni
• Ab initio study of the halo structure in ${}^{11}$Be
• Chiral Effective Field Theory after Thirty Years: Nuclear Lattice Simulations