Octet baryon electroweak form factors in dense nuclear matter

TL;DR

This paper develops a covariant quark model to analyze how the electroweak form factors of octet baryons are modified in dense nuclear matter and finite nuclei, considering medium effects and density profiles.

Contribution

It extends a covariant quark model with meson cloud dressing to include medium modifications of baryon form factors in nuclear environments.

Findings

Medium modifications of form factors increase with density.

Form factors are significantly altered in finite nuclei due to density profiles.

The model provides predictions up to twice the normal nuclear density.

Abstract

Motivated by the necessity of developing theoretical models for studying the electroweak structure of baryons in a nuclear medium, we apply a covariant quark model to study interactions of baryons with nuclear matter. The electromagnetic and axial form factors of the octet baryons are determined by combining a covariant quark model that takes into account the meson cloud dressing of the baryon cores, developed for free space, with the quark-meson coupling model in the extension to the nuclear medium. We discuss the medium modifications on the electroweak form factors of octet baryons for the range of densities from $\rho=0$ up to $\rho=2 \rho_0$, where $\rho_0= 0.15$ fm$^{-3}$ is the normal nuclear matter density. We also study how the shape of the form factors is modified in finite nuclei due to the profile of the nuclear density distributions compared with calculations using the average density of the nucleus