Diproton correlation in a proton-rich Borromean nucleus 17Ne

TL;DR

This study uses three-body model calculations to demonstrate strong diproton correlations in the proton-rich Borromean nucleus 17Ne, revealing that Coulomb repulsion has a minor effect on the proton pairing.

Contribution

The paper introduces a detailed three-body model including Coulomb interaction to analyze diproton correlations in 17Ne, highlighting the spatial compactness of valence protons.

Findings

Diproton correlation is strong in 17Ne's ground state.

Coulomb interaction reduces proton-proton interaction energy by about 14%.

Protons form a spatially compact configuration similar to neutron pairs in 16C.

Abstract

We carry out three-body-model calculations for a proton-rich Borromean nucleus $^{17}$Ne by assuming a $^{15}$O + $p$ + $p$ structure. To this end, we use a density-dependent contact interaction between the valence protons, explicitly treating also the Coulomb interaction. We find that the two-particle density distribution for $^{17}$Ne is similar to that for $^{16}$C, which has two valence neutrons outside the $N$ = 8 core. That is, the two protons take a spatially compact configuration, while the Coulomb repulsion plays a minor role. This indicates that there is a strong diproton correlation in the ground state of the $^{17}$Ne nucleus. We also show that the Coulomb interaction reduces the expectation value of the proton-proton interaction by about 14\%.