Quantal self-consistent cranking model for monopole excitations in even-even light nuclei

TL;DR

This paper develops a quantal self-consistent cranking model for monopole excitations in even-even light nuclei, accurately predicting excitation energies and explaining their variation with nucleon shell occupancy.

Contribution

It introduces a parameter-free, self-consistent cranking model coupling monopole and intrinsic motions, solving coupled equations in the Tamm Dancoff approximation.

Findings

Excitation energies closely match experimental data for several light nuclei.

Monopole excitation energy increases with nucleon shell changes.

Model parameters vary systematically with nuclear structure.

Abstract

In this article, we derive a quantal self-consistent time-reversal invariant parameter-free cranking model for isoscalar monopole excitation coupled to intrinsic motion in even-even light nuclei. The model uses a wavefunction that is a product of monopole and intrinsic wavefunctions and a constrained variational method to derive, from a many-particle Schrodinger equation, a pair of coupled self-consistent cranking-type Schrodinger equations for the monopole and intrinsic systems. The monopole co-ordinate used is the trace of the quadrupole tensor and hence describes the overall deformation of the nucleus. The monopole and intrinsic wavefunctions are coupled to each other by the two cranking equations and their associated parameters and by two constraints imposed on the intrinsic system. For an isotropic Nilsson shell model and an effective residual two-body interaction, the two coupled cranking equations are solved in the Tamm Dancoff approximation. The strength of the interaction is determined from a Hartree-Fock self-consistency argument. The excitation energy of the first excited state is determined and found to agree closely with those observed in the nuclei He-4, Be-8, C-12, O-16 , Ne-20, Mg-24, and Si-28. The variation of the model parameters are explained. In particular, it is found that the monopole excitation energy as a function of the mass number undergoes an increase whenever the nucleons begin to occupy a new sub-shell state with non-zero orbital angular momentum as a consequence of suppressing or constraining the resulting spurious monopole excitation in the intrinsic system.