Short range correlations and wave function factorization in light and finite nuclei

TL;DR

This paper investigates the factorization of nuclear wave functions in light and finite nuclei, supported by recent experimental data and theoretical models, revealing a general property of nuclear correlations.

Contribution

It demonstrates that wave function factorization observed in nuclear matter also occurs in few-body systems and finite nuclei, extending the understanding of nucleon correlations.

Findings

Wave function factorization occurs in few-body systems.

Experimental data supports the convolution model of spectral functions.

Factorization is a general property of nuclear wave functions.

Abstract

Recent BNL and Jlab data provided new evidence on two nucleon correlations (2NC) in nuclei. The data confirm the validity of the convolution model, describing the spectral function (SF) of a correlated pair moving in the mean field with high and low relative and center-of-mass (cm) momenta, respectively. The model is built assuming that the wave function (WF) of a nucleus A, describing a configuration where the cm momentum of a correlated pair is low and its relative momentum is high, factorizes into the product of the two-body WF and that of the A-2 system. Such a factorization has been shown to occur in nuclear matter (NM). Here it is shown that few-body systems exhibit factorization, which seems to be therefore a general property, to be reproduced also in studies of the WF of finite nuclei.