Three-body Description of $2n$-Halo and Unbound $2n$-Systems: $^{22}$C and $^{26}$O

TL;DR

This paper investigates two-neutron correlations in the halo nucleus $^{22}$C and the unbound nucleus $^{26}$O using a three-body model that explicitly includes continuum states and varies pairing interactions.

Contribution

It introduces a three-body structure model for $^{22}$C and $^{26}$O that explicitly incorporates continuum states and examines the effects of different neutron-neutron interactions.

Findings

Configuration mixing depends on the pairing interaction used.

The model successfully describes the ground state properties of $^{22}$C.

Insights into the structure of unbound $^{26}$O are provided.

Abstract

We study the two-neutron correlations in the ground state of the weakly-bound two-neutron halo nucleus $^{22}$C sitting at the edge of the neutron-drip line and also in the unbound nucleus $^{26}$O sitting beyond the neutron dripline. For the present study, we employ a three-body (core$+n+n$) structure model designed for describing the two-neutron halo system by explicit inclusion of unbound continuum states of the subsystem (core$+n$). We use either a density-independent or a density-dependent contact-delta interaction to describe the neutron-neutron interaction and its strength is varied to fix the binding energy. We report the configuration mixing in the ground state of these systems for different choices of pairing interactions.