Relativistic symmetry breaking in light kaonic nuclei

TL;DR

This paper explores how strong attraction between $K^{-}$ mesons and nucleons in light kaonic nuclei causes significant density enhancement, symmetry violations, and shifts in nuclear structure, using relativistic mean field theory.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed analysis of relativistic symmetry breaking effects in light kaonic nuclei due to $K^{-}$-nucleon interactions, revealing novel structural phenomena.

Findings

Enhanced nuclear density in kaonic nuclei

Violation of pseudospin symmetry

Increased spin-orbit splittings

Abstract

As the experimental data from kaonic atoms and $K^{-}N$ scatterings imply that the $K^{-}$-nucleon interaction is strongly attractive at saturation density, there is a possibility to form $K^{-}$-nuclear bound states or kaonic nuclei. In this work, we investigate the ground-state properties of the light kaonic nuclei with the relativistic mean field theory. It is found that the strong attraction between $K^{-}$ and nucleons reshapes the scalar and vector meson fields, leading to the remarkable enhancement of the nuclear density in the interior of light kaonic nuclei and the manifest shift of the single-nucleon energy spectra and magic numbers therein. As a consequence, the pseudospin symmetry is shown to be violated together with enlarged spin-orbit splittings in these kaonic nuclei.