New Results on Three-Nucleon Short-Range Correlations

TL;DR

This paper reviews recent findings on two-nucleon short-range correlations, emphasizing the dominance of proton-neutron pairs, and predicts the structure and experimental signatures of three-nucleon SRCs based on this dominance.

Contribution

It introduces a new prediction linking the 3N-SRC structure to 2N-SRC observations through a quadratic relation, supported by experimental data.

Findings

Proton-neutron SRCs dominate over proton-proton and neutron-neutron SRCs.

The height of the 3N-SRC plateau relates quadratically to the 2N-SRC plateau.

Experimental data supports the predicted quadratic relation.

Abstract

The recent progress in studies of two-nucleon~(2N) short-range correlations~(SRCs) are reviewed with the main emphasize given to the observation of the strong dominance of proton-neutron~(pn) SRCs in nuclei as compared to proton-proton and neutron-neutron SRCs. Based on the pn SRC dominance a specific prediction is made for the dynamical structure of 3N- SRCs for inclusive $A(e,e^\prime)X$ reactions, according to which the 3N- SRCs are generated through the sequence of two short range $pn$ interactions. This allowed us to predict that the height of the plateau in the ratios of inclusive eA cross sections to that of $^3He$ in the 3N-SRC region is related to the height of the plateau in the 2N-SRC region by a quadratic relation. The analysis of the available experimental data supports validity of such a relation.