Asymptotic normalization coefficients from ab initio calculations

TL;DR

This paper introduces a Green's function method to compute asymptotic normalization coefficients (ANCs) from ab initio nuclear calculations, enabling accurate analysis of nuclear structure and reactions for light nuclei.

Contribution

The authors develop a novel Green's function approach to calculate ANCs directly from variational Monte Carlo wave functions, overcoming previous computational challenges.

Findings

First ab initio calculations of ANCs for most nuclei studied.

Method accurately computes ANCs at physical separation energies.

Results agree with experimental data where available.

Abstract

We present calculations of asymptotic normalization coefficients (ANCs) for one-nucleon removals from nuclear states of mass numbers 3 to 9. Our ANCs were computed from variational Monte Carlo solutions to the many-body Schroedinger equation with the combined Argonne v18 two-nucleon and Urbana IX three-nucleon potentials. Instead of computing explicit overlap integrals, we applied a Green's function method that is insensitive to the difficulties of constructing and Monte Carlo sampling the long-range tails of the variational wave functions. This method also allows computation of the ANC at the physical separation energy, even when it differs from the separation energy for the Hamiltonian. We compare our results, which for most nuclei are the first ab initio calculations of ANCs, with existing experimental and theoretical results and discuss further possible applications of the technique.