Nucleon momentum distributions of complex nuclei from inclusive electron scattering

TL;DR

This paper improves the extraction of nucleon momentum distributions from inclusive electron scattering data in complex nuclei by refining the treatment of excitation energy, leading to better agreement with ab initio calculations and insights into Fermi motion and short-range correlations.

Contribution

An improved description of excitation energy in the relativistic Fermi gas model enhances the accuracy of nucleon momentum distributions for complex nuclei.

Findings

Better agreement with ab initio calculations across momentum ranges

Accurate reproduction of Fermi motion and SRC behaviors

Provides new experimental insights into nuclear structure

Abstract

Nucleon momentum distributions (NMDs) reveal essential information about Fermi motion and short-range correlations (SRCs). In extracting NMDs from inclusive electron scattering data, theoretical analyses, such as the scaling analysis, are typically employed. For complex nuclei, consistently treating the excitation energy of the residual system is a complicated task, leading to discrepancies between existing extracted NMDs and ab initio calculations, particularly around the Fermi momentum $k_F$. To address this issue, we introduce an improved description of the excitation energy in the framework of the relativistic Fermi gas (RFG) model. With this treatment, the extracted NMDs of complex nuclei show better agreement with ab initio calculations across the low- and high-momentum range, especially around $k_F$, successfully reproducing both the behaviors of Fermi motion and SRCs. These results provide a new experimental perspective on the interplay between Fermi motion and SRCs in complex nuclei.