Cold compression of nuclei induced by antiprotons

TL;DR

This paper investigates how antiprotons can induce nuclear compression, modeling the process with relativistic and transport theories, and proposes observable signatures of such compressed states in nuclear reactions.

Contribution

It introduces a combined dynamical RMF and GiBUU approach to simulate antiproton-induced nuclear compression and identifies measurable signals of the compressed state.

Findings

Compressed nuclear states form within 4-10 fm/c after antiproton implantation.

Proposed observables include nucleon energy spectra and meson invariant mass distributions.

Simulation results suggest detectable signatures of nuclear compression in experiments.

Abstract

On the basis of a dynamical Relativistic Mean Field (RMF) model we study the response of a nucleus on the antiproton implanted in its interior. We solve the Vlasov equation for the antiproton-nuclear system and show assuming a moderately attractive antiproton optical potential that the compressed state is formed on a rather short time scale of about 4-10 fm/c. The evolution of the system after antiproton annihilation is simulated using the Giessen Boltzmann-Uehling-Uhlenbeck (GiBUU) transport model. Finally, several sensitive observables to the antiproton annihilation in a compressed nuclear configuration are proposed, e.g. the nucleon kinetic energy spectra and the total invariant mass distributions of produced mesons.