Neutron skin thickness of $^{48}$Ca, $^{132}$Sn and $^{208}$Pb with KIDS density functional

TL;DR

This study calculates neutron skin thicknesses of specific nuclei using the KIDS density functional, constraining model parameters from nuclear and neutron star data, revealing strong correlations among the nuclei.

Contribution

The paper introduces a method to determine neutron skin thicknesses with constrained parameters from nuclear and astrophysical data within the KIDS density functional framework.

Findings

Neutron skin thicknesses are 0.161, 0.220, 0.160 fm for $^{48}$Ca, $^{132}$Sn, and $^{208}$Pb.

Strong correlations found between the neutron skin thicknesses of the three nuclei.

High correlation coefficients (0.978 and 0.996) indicate linked neutron skin properties.

Abstract

Neutron skin thickness ($R_{np}$) of the atomic nuclei $^{48}$Ca, $^{132}$Sn and $^{208}$Pb are considered in the KIDS (Korea:IBS-Daegu-Sungkyunkwan) density functional formalism. Model parameters most relevant to $R_{np}$ are constrained from standard nuclear data and neutron star properties determined from modern observations. Mean values of $R_{np}$ are obtained as 0.161, 0.220 and 0.160 fm for $^{48}$Ca, $^{132}$Sn and $^{208}$Pb, respectively, and the corresponding standard deviations are 0.011, 0.020 and 0.021 fm. Correlations between $R_{np}$ of the three nuclei are considered, and we find that $R_{np}$'s are correlated very strongly. We obtain correlation coefficient 0.978 between $R_{np}$ of $^{48}$Ca and $^{208}$Pb, and 0.996 between $R_{np}$ of $^{132}$Sn and $^{208}$Pb.