Ab initio calculations of reactions with light nuclei

TL;DR

This paper reviews ab initio calculations of light nuclei reactions using a unified no-core shell model with continuum, starting from chiral Hamiltonians, to better understand nuclear interactions and predict reaction rates.

Contribution

It presents a comprehensive review of ab initio methods combining the no-core shell model with continuum for light nuclei reactions based on chiral Hamiltonians.

Findings

Successful description of nucleon and deuterium scattering

Unified approach to bound and scattering states

Enhanced predictive capability for nuclear reaction rates

Abstract

An {\em ab initio} (i.e., from first principles) theoretical framework capable of providing a unified description of the structure and low-energy reaction properties of light nuclei is desirable to further our understanding of the fundamental interactions among nucleons, and provide accurate predictions of crucial reaction rates for nuclear astrophysics, fusion-energy research, and other applications. In this contribution we review {\em ab initio} calculations for nucleon and deuterium scattering on light nuclei starting from chiral two- and three-body Hamiltonians, obtained within the framework of the {\em ab initio} no-core shell model with continuum. This is a unified approach to nuclear bound and scattering states, in which square-integrable energy eigenstates of the $A$-nucleon system are coupled to $(A-a)+a$ target-plus-projectile wave functions in the spirit of the resonating group method to obtain an efficient description of the many-body nuclear dynamics both at short and medium distances and at long ranges.