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Nuclear physics

The skin of a nucleus

Nature Physics volume 12, pages 116–117 (2016)Cite this article

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Ab initio calculations of an atomic nucleus with 48 nucleons set a benchmark for computational nuclear physics and provide new insights into the properties of the atomic nucleus and strongly interacting matter.

The atomic nucleus is a complex quantum-mechanical system that poses significant challenges for theoretical physicists. The strong interaction between component nucleons (protons and neutrons) depends on many quantities: the nucleons' radial separation, relative kinetic energies, relative directions of intrinsic spin and relative angular momentum. There is also a strong coupling between the spin of a nucleon and its orbital motion (nuclear spin–orbit coupling). Furthermore, the nucleus is one of the few systems in nature that manifests three-body forces — forces that exist only when three bodies are interacting, irreducible to pair-wise interactions. To add further complexity, most nuclei are quantum many-body systems that are not amenable to a perturbative treatment, which is the approach taken, for example, when dealing with electrons in an atom.

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  1. Daniel P. Watts is at the School of Physics and Astronomy, The University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH9 3FD, UK,

    Daniel P. Watts

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  1. Daniel P. Watts
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Correspondence to Daniel P. Watts.

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Watts, D. The skin of a nucleus. Nature Phys 12, 116–117 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys3654

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