Improving relativistic energy density functionals with tensor couplings

TL;DR

This paper introduces a new relativistic energy density functional with tensor couplings, improving predictions of nuclear properties, the equation of state, and neutron star characteristics by incorporating additional meson-nucleon interactions.

Contribution

The work develops a novel relativistic EDF including tensor couplings and density-dependent meson-nucleon interactions, calibrated with experimental data.

Findings

Enhanced accuracy in nuclear property predictions

Improved modeling of the nuclear matter equation of state

More realistic neutron star property predictions

Abstract

Energy density functionals (EDFs) have been used extensively with great success to calculate properties of nuclei and to predict the equation of state (EOS) of dense nuclear matter. Besides non-relativistic EDFs, mostly of the Skyrme or Gogny type, relativistic EDFs of different types are in widespread use. In these latter approaches, the effective in-medium interaction is described by an exchange of mesons between nucleons. In most cases, only minimal meson-nucleon couplings are considered. The effects of additional tensor couplings were rarely investigated. In this work, a new relativistic EDF with tensor couplings and density dependent minimal meson-nucleon couplings will be presented. The parameters of the model are determined using a carefully selected set of experimental data with realistic uncertainties that are determined self-consistently. Predictions for various nuclear observables, the nuclear matter equation of state, and properties of neutron stars are discussed.