Microscopic description of large amplitude collective motion in the nuclear astrophysics context

TL;DR

This paper reviews the application of time-dependent energy density functional theory (TD-EDF) to model large amplitude nuclear collective motions relevant to astrophysics, highlighting its predictive capabilities and recent simulation advancements.

Contribution

It provides an overview of how TD-EDF has been benchmarked and applied to astrophysically relevant nuclear processes using advanced 3D simulations.

Findings

TD-EDF effectively models giant resonances and fission.

Simulations capture binary and ternary collision dynamics.

The approach offers unified treatment of nuclear structure and reactions.

Abstract

In the last 10 years, we have observed an important increase of interest in the application of time-dependent energy density functional theory (TD-EDF). This approach allows to treat nuclear structure and nuclear reaction from small to large amplitude dynamics in a unified framework. The possibility to perform unrestricted three-dimensional simulations using state of the art effective interactions has opened new perspectives. In the present article, an overview of applications where the predictive power of TD-EDF has been benchmarked is given. A special emphasize is made on processes that are of astrophysical interest. Illustrations discussed here include giant resonances, fission, binary and ternary collisions leading to fusion, transfer and deep inelastic processes.