No Arabic abstract
Projection Monte Carlo calculations of lattice Chiral Effective Field Theory suffer from sign oscillations to a varying degree dependent on the number of protons and neutrons. Hence, such studies have hitherto been concentrated on nuclei with equal numbers of protons and neutrons, and especially on the alpha nuclei where the sign oscillations are smallest. Here, we introduce the symmetry-sign extrapolation method, which allows us to use the approximate Wigner SU(4) symmetry of the nuclear interaction to systematically extend the Projection Monte Carlo calculations to nuclear systems where the sign problem is severe. We benchmark this method by calculating the ground-state energies of the $^{12}$C, $^6$He and $^6$Be nuclei, and discuss its potential for studies of neutron-rich halo nuclei and asymmetric nuclear matter.
We study the triton and three-nucleon force at lowest chiral order in pionless effective field theory both in the Hamiltonian and Euclidean nuclear lattice formalism. In the case of the Euclidean lattice formalism, we derive the exact few-body worldline amplitudes corresponding to the standard many-body lattice action. This will be useful for setting low-energy coefficients in future nuclear lattice simulations. We work in the Wigner SU(4)-symmetric limit where the S-wave scattering lengths {1}S{0} and {3}S{1} are equal. By comparing with continuum results, we demonstrate for the first time that the nuclear lattice formalism can be used to study few-body nucleon systems.
Nucleon-nucleon (NN) potential is studied by lattice QCD simulations in the quenched approximation, using the plaquette gauge action and the Wilson quark action on a 32^4 (simeq (4.4 fm)^4) lattice. A NN potential V_{NN}(r) is defined from the equal-time Bethe-Salpeter amplitude with a local interpolating operator for the nucleon. By studying the NN interaction in the ^1S_0 and ^3S_1 channels, we show that the central part of V_{NN}(r) has a strong repulsive core of a few hundred MeV at short distances (r alt 0.5 fm) surrounded by an attractive well at medium and long distances. These features are consistent with the known phenomenological features of the nuclear force.
Second order beta-decay processes with and without neutrinos in the final state are key probes of nuclear physics and of the nature of neutrinos. Neutrinoful double-beta decay is the rarest Standard Model process that has been observed and provides a unique test of the understanding of weak nuclear interactions. Observation of neutrinoless double-beta decay would reveal that neutrinos are Majorana fermions and that lepton number conservation is violated in nature. While significant progress has been made in phenomenological approaches to understanding these processes, establishing a connection between these processes and the physics of the Standard Model and beyond is a critical task as it will provide input into the design and interpretation of future experiments. The strong-interaction contributions to double-beta decay processes are non-perturbative and can only be addressed systematically through a combination of lattice Quantum Chromoodynamics (LQCD) and nuclear many-body calculations. In this review, current efforts to establish the LQCD connection are discussed for both neutrinoful and neutrinoless double-beta decay. LQCD calculations of the hadronic contributions to the neutrinoful process $nnto pp e^- e^- bar u_ebar u_e$ and to various neutrinoless pionic transitions are reviewed, and the connections of these calculations to the phenomenology of double-beta decay through the use of effective field theory (EFTs) is highlighted. At present, LQCD calculations are limited to small nuclear systems, and to pionic subsystems, and require matching to appropriate EFTs to have direct phenomenological impact. However, these calculations have already revealed qualitatively that there are terms in the EFTs that can only be constrained from double-beta decay processes themselves or using inputs from LQCD. Future prospects for direct calculations in larger nuclei are also discussed.
We investigate Nuclear Lattice Effective Field Theory for the two-body system for several lattice spacings at lowest order in the pionless as well as in the pionful theory. We discuss issues of regularizations and predictions for the effective range expansion. In the pionless case, a simple Gaussian smearing allows to demonstrate lattice spacing independence over a wide range of lattice spacings. We show that regularization methods known from the continuum formulation are necessary as well as feasible for the pionful approach.
We explore the lattice spacing dependence in Nuclear Lattice Effective Field Theory for few-body systems up to next-to-next-to leading order in chiral effective field theory including all isospin breaking and electromagnetic effects, the complete two-pion-exchange potential and the three-nucleon forces. We calculate phase shifts in the neutron-proton system and proton-proton systems as well as the scattering length in the neutron-neutron system. We then perform a full next-to-next-to-leading order calculation with two-nucleon and three-nucleon forces for the triton and helium-4 and analyse their binding energy correlation. We show how the Tjon band is reached by decreasing the lattice spacing and confirm the continuum observation that a four-body force is not necessary to describe light nuclei.