Recently a formalism for a direct treatment of the Faddeev equation for the three-nucleon bound state in three dimensions has been proposed. It relies on an operator representation of the Faddeev component in the momentum space and leads to a finite set of coupled equations for scalar functions which depend only on three variables. In this paper we provide further elements of this formalism and show the first numerical results for chiral NNLO nuclear forces.
In this paper, we study the relativistic effects in a three-body bound state. For this purpose, the relativistic form of the Faddeev equations is solved in momentum space as a function of the Jacobi momentum vectors without using a partial wave decomposition. The inputs for the three-dimensional Faddeev integral equation are the off-shell boost two-body $t-$matrices, which are calculated directly from the boost two-body interactions by solving the Lippmann-Schwinger equation. The matrix elements of the boost interactions are obtained from the nonrelativistic interactions by solving a nonlinear integral equation using an iterative scheme. The relativistic effects on three-body binding energy are calculated for the Malfliet-Tjon potential. Our calculations show that the relativistic effects lead to a roughly 2% reduction in the three-body binding energy. The contribution of different Faddeev components in the normalization of the relativistic three-body wave function is studied in detail. The accuracy of our numerical solutions is tested by calculation of the expectation value of the three-body mass operator, which shows an excellent agreement with the relativistic energy eigenvalue.
We examine the extent to which the properties of three-nucleon bound states are well-reproduced in the limit that nuclear forces satisfy Wigners SU(4) (spin-isospin) symmetry. To do this we compute the charge radii up to next-to-leading order (NLO) in an effective field theory (EFT) that is an expansion in powers of $R/a$, with $R$ the range of the nuclear force and $a$ the nucleon-nucleon ($N!N$) scattering lengths. In the Wigner-SU(4) limit, the triton and Helium-3 point charge radii are equal. At NLO in the range expansion both are $1.66$ fm. Adding the first-order corrections due to the breaking of Wigner symmetry in the $N!N$ scattering lengths gives a ${}^3mathrm{H}$ point charge radius of $1.58$ fm, which is remarkably close to the experimental number, $1.5978pm0.040$ fm (Angeli and Marinova in At Data Nucl Data Tables 99:69-95, 2013). For the ${}^3mathrm{He}$ point charge radius we find $1.70$ fm, about 4% away from the experimental value of $1.77527pm0.0054$ fm (Angeli and Marinova 2013). We also examine the Faddeev components that enter the tri-nucleon wave function and find that an expansion of them in powers of the symmetry-breaking parameter converges rapidly. Wigners SU(4) symmetry is thus a useful starting point for understanding tri-nucleon bound-state properties.
Firstly, a systematic procedure is derived for obtaining three-dimensional bound-state equations from four-dimensional ones. Unlike ``quasi-potential approaches this procedure does not involve the use of delta-function constraints on the relative four-momentum. In the absence of negative-energy states, the kernels of the three-dimensional equations derived by this technique may be represented as sums of time-ordered perturbation theory diagrams. Consequently, such equations have two major advantages over quasi-potential equations: they may easily be written down in any Lorentz frame, and they include the meson-retardation effects present in the original four-dimensional equation. Secondly, a simple four-dimensional equation with the correct one-body limit is obtained by a reorganization of the generalized ladder Bethe-Salpeter kernel. Thirdly, our approach to deriving three-dimensional equations is applied to this four-dimensional equation, thus yielding a retarded interaction for use in the three-dimensional bound-state equation of Wallace and Mandelzweig. The resulting three-dimensional equation has the correct one-body limit and may be systematically improved upon. The quality of the three-dimensional equation, and our general technique for deriving such equations, is then tested by calculating bound-state properties in a scalar field theory using six different bound-state equations. It is found that equations obtained using the method espoused here approximate the wave functions obtained from their parent four-dimensional equations significantly better than the corresponding quasi-potential equations do.
The Faddeev equations for the three body bound state are solved directly as three dimensional integral equation without employing partial wave decomposition. The numerical stability of the algorithm is demonstrated. The three body binding energy is calculated for Malfliet-Tjon type potentials and compared with results obtained from calculations based on partial wave decomposition. The full three body wave function is calculated as function of the vector Jacobi momenta. It is shown that it satisfies the Schrodinger equation with high accuracy. The properties of the full wave function are displayed and compared to the ones of the corresponding wave functions obtained as finite sum of partial wave components. The agreement between the two approaches is essentially perfect in all respects.