The anti-D meson self-energy is evaluated self-consistently, using unitarized coupled-channel theory, by computing the in-medium meson-baryon T-matrix in the C=-1,S=0 sector. The heavy pseudo-scalar and heavy vector mesons, anti-D and anti-D^*, are treated on equal footing as required by heavy quark spin symmetry. Results for energy levels and widths of D^- mesic atoms in 12C, 40Ca, 118Sn and 208Pb are presented. The spectrum contains states of atomic and of nuclear types for all nuclei. anti-D^0--nucleus bound states are also obtained. We find that, after electromagnetic and nuclear cascade, these systems end up with the anti-D bound in the nucleus, either as a meson or as part of a exotic anti-D N (pentaquark) loosely bound state.
Formation of eta-mesic nucleus, a bound state of an eta meson in a nucleus, is reviewed in this paper. Three different theoretical approaches are used to calculate the binding energies and widths of such nuclei. The effect of eta-mesic nucleus in pion double-charge-exchange reaction is discussed. Experimental efforts by different groups to detect the nucleus are also discussed. The ramifications of the theoretical and experimental studies of the bound state of eta in a nucleus are pointed out.
The binding system of a hadron and a nucleus is a topic of great interest for investigating the hadron properties. In the heavy-flavor region, the attraction between a $P(=\bar{D},B)$ meson and a nucleon $N$ can appear, where the $PN-P^\ast N$ mixing plays an important role in relation to the heavy-quark spin symmetry. The attraction can produce exotic heavy mesic nuclei that are stable against the strong decay. We study an exotic system where the $\bar{D}$ ($B$) meson and nucleus are bound. The meson-nucleus interaction is given by a folding potential with single-channel $PN$ interaction and …
The missing-mass spectrum obtained in a recoil-free transfer reaction p($^{27}$Al,$^{3}$He)$π^{-}$p'X is analyzed. We find that the observed peak structure arises from the coherent contributions from two reaction processes in the energy region corresponding to a bound eta ($η$) meson. In one of the processes the intermediate $η$ is captured by the nucleus to form the $η$-mesic nucleus $^{25}$Mg$_η$. In the other process, the $η$ does not form $η$-nucleus bound state. The interference between these two processes has caused the peak of the spectrum to appear at an $η$ binding energy stronger tha…
We calculate formation spectra of eta-nucleus systems in (pi,N) reactions with nuclear targets, which can be performed at existing and/or forthcoming facilities, including J-PARC, in order to investigate eta-nucleus interactions. Based on the N^*(1535) dominance in the eta N system, eta-mesic nuclei are suitable systems for study of in-medium properties of the N^*(1535) baryon resonance, such as reduction of the mass difference of N and N^* in nuclear medium, which affects level structure of the eta and N^*-hole modes. We find that clear information on the in-medium N^*- and eta-nucleus intera…
We study $ϕ$-meson production in nuclei to investigate the in-medium modification of the $ϕ$-meson spectral function at finite density. We consider (${\bar p},ϕ$), ($γ,p$) and ($π^-,n$) reactions to produce a $ϕ$-meson inside the nucleus and evaluate the effects of the medium modifications to reaction cross sections. The structures of the bound states, $ϕ$-mesic nuclei, are also studied. For strong absorptive interaction cases, we need to know the spectrum shape in a wide energy region to deduce the properties of $ϕ$.
Eta-mesic nucleus or the quasibound nuclear state of an eta ($η$) meson in a nucleus is caused by strong-interaction force alone. This new type of nuclear species, which extends the landscape of nuclear physics, has been extensively studied since its prediction in 1986. In this paper, we review and analyze in great detail the models of the fundamental $η$--nucleon interaction leading to the formation of an $η$--mesic nucleus, the methods used in calculating the properties of a bound $η$, and the approaches employed in the interpretation of the pertinent experimental data. In view of the succes…
The experimental data of the COSY-GEM Collaboration for the recoil-free transfer reaction p (27Al, 3He) π- p' X, leading to the formation of bound state of eta (η) meson in 25Mg nucleus, is reanalyzed in this paper. In particular, predicted values of binding energy and half-width of the η-mesic nucleus 25Mgη, given by different theoretical approaches, are compared with the ones obtained from the experimental missing mass spectrum. It is found that the spectrum can be explained reasonably well if interference effect of another process, where ηis not bound in 25Mg but is scattered by the nucleus…
Even if the theoretical definition of an unstable state is straightforward, its experimental identification often depends on the method used in the analysis and extraction of data. A good example is the case of eta mesic nuclei where strong hints of their existence led to about three decades of extensive theoretical and experimental searches. Considering the still undecided status of these states and the limitations in the understanding of the eta-nucleon as well as the eta-nucleus interaction, the present article tries to look back at some unresolved problems in the production mechanism and f…
We investigate the structure and formation of charmed meson--nucleus systems, with the aim of understanding the charmed meson--nucleon interactions and the properties of the charmed mesons in the nuclear medium. The $\bar{D}$ mesic nuclei are of special interest, since they have tiny decay widths due to the absence of strong decays for the $\bar{D} N$ pair. Employing an effective model for the $\bar{D} N$ and $D N$ interactions and solving the Klein--Gordon equation for $\bar{D}$ and $D$ in finite nuclei, we find that the $D^{-}$-${}^{11}\rm{B}$ system has $1 s$ and $2p$ mesic nuclear states a…
We present a theoretical study on formation rates of ηand ωmeson-nucleus systems induced by (γ,p) reactions on nuclear targets at ideal recoilless condition. We find that the smaller distortion effect in the (γ,p) reaction enables us to investigate properties of the mesons created deeply inside nucleus more clearly. We also consider excitation of scalar-isoscalar (σ) mode in nucleus in order to investigate spectral enhancement around two-pion threshold caused by partial restoration of chiral symmetry. We conclude that valuable information of meson-nucleus interactions can be extracted from glo…
A microscopic treatment of eta-nucleus system is presented. Using this, the poles of the amplitude describing elastic scattering of eta-meson off the light nuclei ^2H, ^3H, ^3He, and ^4He have been located in the second quadrant of the complex plane of the eta-nucleus relative momentum. The results obtained indicate that, within the existing uncertainties in the eta-Nucleon input data, a bound state could exist. By a qualitative consideration it is shown that such bound-states, cannot be narrow. It is further shown that scattering length calculations cannot provide a definite answer on the que…
Using the quark-meson coupling (QMC) model, we investigate whether $ω, η, η'$ and $D^-$ mesons form meson-nucleus bound states. Our results suggest that one should expect to find $η$- and $ω$-nucleus bound states in all the nuclei considered. Furthermore, it is shown that the $D^-$ meson will form quite narrow bound states with $^{208}$Pb.
We calculate theoretically the formation spectra of eta'(958)-nucleus systems in the (p,d) reaction for the investigation of the in-medium modification of the eta' mass. We show the comprehensive numerical calculations based on a simple form of the eta' optical potential in nuclei with various potential depths. We conclude that one finds an evidence of possible attractive interaction between eta' and nucleus as peak structure appearing around the eta' threshold in light nuclei such as 11C when the attractive potential is stronger than 100 MeV and the absorption width is of order of 40 MeV or l…
Using the Green function method, binding effects on produced eta-mesons in the two-stage reaction γ+ A \to N + η+ (A-1) \to N + (πN) + (A-2) are studied. The energy spectrum of the correlated pi-N pairs which arise from decays of etas inside the nucleus is strongly affected by an attractive eta-nucleus optical potential. Its resonant behavior gives a clear signal of formating intermediate eta-mesic nuclei.
Using the quark-meson coupling (QMC) model, we investigate theoretically whether $η$ and $ω$ mesons form meson-nucleus bound states. We study several nuclei from $^{6}$He to $^{208}$Pb, including those which are the final nuclei in the proposed experiment at GSI. Results for the $ω$ are compared with those of the Walecka model. Our results suggest that one should expect to find $η$- and $ω$-nucleus bound states in all these nuclei. Furthermore, we investigate the possibility of charmed mesic nuclei. It is shown that the $D^-$ meson will inevitably form narrow bound states with $^{208}$Pb.
We propose to use the recoilless (d,$^3$He) reaction to produce $η$-mesic nuclei. This reaction has been used to observe deeply bound pionic states and proven to be powerful recently. We calculate $η$-mesic bound states in the nucleus using an optical potential and their formation cross section with the Green function method. Then, we carefully check the experimental feasibility. We find that $η$-mesic nuclei can be observed experimentally using the (d,$^3$He) reaction. We also mention the possibility to study the formation of $ω$-mesic nuclei.
The $η$ mesic nucleus is considered to be one of the interesting exotic many body systems and has been studied since 1980's theoretically and experimentally. Recently, the formation of the $η$ mesic nucleus in the fusion reactions of the light nuclei such as $d + d \rightarrow (η+ α) \rightarrow X$ has been proposed and the experiments have been performed by WASA-at-COSY. We develop a theoretical model to evaluate the formation rate of the $η$ mesic nucleus in the fusion reactions and show the calculated results. We find that the $η$ bound states could be observed in the reactions in cases wit…
The structure of eta-nucleus bound systems (eta mesic nuclei) is investigated as one of the tools to study in-medium properties of the N(1535) (N^*) resonance by using the chiral doublet model to incorporate the medium effects of the N^* resonance in a chiral symmetric way. We find that the shape and the depth of the eta-nucleus optical potential are strongly affected by the in-medium properties of the N^* and the nucleon. Especially, as a general feature of the potential, the existence of a repulsive core of the eta-nucleus potential at the nuclear center with an attractive part at the nuclea…
The structure of eta-nucleus bound systems (eta mesic nuclei) is investigated as one of the tools to study in-medium properties of the N(1535) (N*) resonance. We show that, as a general consequence, the eta-nucleus potential has a repulsive core at the nuclear center with an attractive part at the nuclear surface, if sufficient reduction of the mass difference of N and N* stems from the in-medium effects to N*. The (d,3He) spectra are evaluated for the formation of these bound states to investigate the experimental feasibility.
The isoscalar $η$ and $η'$ mesons are special in QCD, being linked both to chiral symmetry and to non-perturbative glue associated with the axial anomaly. The properties of these mesons in medium are sensitive to how these dynamics work in the nuclear environment. In contrast to pionic and kaonic atoms which are mainly bound by the Coulomb interaction with some corrections due to the strong force (Coulomb assisted binding), the $η$ and $η'$ as neutral mesons can only be bound by the strong interaction. Is this interaction strong enough? This topic has inspired a vigorous program of experiments…
We study the structure and formation of the $ϕ$ mesic nuclei to investigate the in-medium modification of the $ϕ$-meson spectral function at finite density. We consider (${\bar p},ϕ$), ($γ,p$) and ($π^-,n$) reactions to produce a $ϕ$-meson inside the nucleus and evaluate the effects of its medium modifications to the reaction cross sections. We also estimate the consequences of the uncertainties of the ${\bar K}$ selfenergy in medium to the $ϕ$-nucleus interaction. We find that it may be possible to see a peak structure in the reaction spectra for the strong attractive potential cases. On the …
We demonstrate that the binding energies and widths of eta-mesic nuclei depend strongly on subthreshold eta-N interaction. This strong dependence is made evident from comparing three different eta-nucleus optical potentials: (1) a microscopic optical potential taking into account the full effects of off-shell eta-nucleon interactions; (2) a factorization approximation to the microscopic optical potential where a downward energy shift parameter is introduced to approximate the subthreshold eta-nucleon interaction; and (3) an optical potential using on-shell eta-nucleon scattering length as the …
We study eta meson properties in the infinite nuclear matter and in atomic nuclei with an emphasis on effects of the eta coupling to N*(1535)--nucleon-hole modes. The N*(1535) resonance, which dominates the low-energy eta-nucleon scattering, can be seen as a chiral partner of the nucleon. The change of the chiral mass gap between the N* and the nucleon in a nuclear medium has an impact on the properties of the eta-nucleus system. If the N*-nucleon mass gap decreases with a density increase (chiral symmetry restoration) the calculations show the existence of the resonance state at the energy ab…
The energies and widths of several D^0 meson bound states for different nuclei are obtained using a D-meson selfenergy in the nuclear medium, which is evaluated in a selfconsistent manner using techniques of unitarized coupled-channel theory. The kernel of the meson-baryon interaction is based on a model that treats heavy pseudoscalar and heavy vector mesons on equal footing, as required by heavy quark symmetry. We find D^0 bound states in all studied nuclei, from 12C up to 208Pb. The inclusion of vector mesons is the keystone for obtaining an attractive D-nucleus interaction that leads to the…
We revisit the derivation of the covariant two-body scalar-fermion equation with a Coulomb interaction, presented in a previous paper. We show that it can be given the formal aspect of a Dirac equation, but for the fact that the eigenvalue is also contained in one of the coefficients and thus it is not linearly included. The discussion of the boundary value problem is therefore different, although some properties of the Dirac equation can be recovered in an approximation bringing back to the concept of reduced mass. We discuss a mixed analytic-numerical method of solution which allows to obtai…
The T-noninvariant transverse polarization of neutrons is considered for muon capture by a 6-Li nucleus with decay into a quasistationary 2+ state of the three particle alpha+n+n continuum. This polarization is orthogonal to the plane spanned by the polarization axis of the initial mesic atom and the neutron momentum. The situation in which neutrons that are emitted in the plane orthogonal to the axis of the mesic-atom polarization and which have oppositely directed momenta equal in magnitude are selected is analyzed. The wave function of the final state is constructed by using the method of h…
We develop a model to evaluate the formation rate of the heavy mesic nuclei in the two nucleon pick-up reactions, and apply it to the $^6$Li target cases for the formation of heavy meson-$α$ bound states, as examples. The existence of the quasi-deuteron in the target nucleus is assumed in this model. It is found that the mesic nuclei formation in the recoilless kinematics is possible even for heavier mesons than nucleon in the two nucleon pick-up reactions. We find the formation rate of the meson-$α$ bound states can be around half of the elementary cross sections at the recoilless kinematics …
We have investigated the 6Li(gamma, d) reaction theoretically for the formation of the eta'(958) mesic nucleus. We have reported the numerical results in this article.
The use of scattering length of particle-target interaction due to real- valued potential to study the bound states of the particle-target system is well known in nuclear and atomic physics. In view of the current interest in using eta-nucleus scattering length to infer the existence of eta-mesic nucleus, we derive general analytic expressions that relate the binding energy and half-width of an unstable bound state to the complex-valued scattering length due to the same particle-target interaction.
We have investigated the 6Li(gamma,d) reaction theoretically for the formation of the eta'(958) mesic nucleus close to the recoilless kinematics. We have developed the theoretical formula and reported the quantitative results of the formation spectra for various cases in this article. We have found that the formation cross sections are reduced by the effects of the fragile deuteron form factor.
The η-meson collision with light nuclei, ^2H, ^3H, ^3He, and ^4He, is considered on the basis of a microscopic approach which utilises Faddeev type and Lippmann-Schwinger equations. The nuclear hamiltonian is approximated by the finite rank approximation which amounts to the coherent approximation. The η-nucleus scattering length and the resonance and bound--state poles of the amplitude describing elastic scattering of η-meson by these nuclei are obtained. For each of the nuclei considered, the minimal factor enhancing the ηN--attraction that moves the poles to the quasi--bound state area of t…
The possible existence of $η$-mesic nuclei poses an interesting and still open issue of research. Since the occurence of such $η$-nucleus bound states is reflected in the corresponding $η$-nucleus scattering length, we critically review the present knowledge for the $η$$^3$He system. Specifically, we scrutinize the available experimental information for the reaction $p{+}d \to η{+} ^3{\rm He}$ which is commonly used to extract the $η$$^3$He scattering length. We point out several striking discrepancies between the various measurements. Subject to those inconsistencies we deduce a value of $a{=…
The connection of the binding energy and width of possible bound eta-mesic states is given to the complex scattering length for s-states in the hope that, with knowledge of the final state interaction this could be useful in searches of these states. In spite of the strong direct potential dependence of both observables this connection is seen to be very model independent even for various nuclei once the influence of also the effective range is considered. The importance of this term is pointed also for data analyses. Although the nucleus considered here is 12C, extension to other nuclei is im…
Effective nuclear densities probed by kaon- and anti-kaon-nucleus systems are studied theoretically both for bound and low energy scattering states. As for the anti-kaon bound states, we investigate kaonic atoms. We find that the effective density depends on the atomic states significantly and we have the possibility to obtain the anti-kaon properties at various nuclear densities by observing the several kaonic atom states. We also find the energy dependence of the probed density by kaon and anti-kaon scattering states. We find that the study of the effective nuclear density will help to find …
We study theoretically the kaonic atom and kaonic nucleus formations in the in--flight ($K^-,p$) reactions using the Green function method, which is suited to evaluate formation rates both of stable and unstable bound systems. We consider $^{12}$C and $^{16}$O as the targets and calculate the spectra of the ($K^-,p$) reactions. We conclude that a no peak structure due to kaonic nucleus formation is expected in the reaction spectra calculated with the chiral unitary kaon--nucleus optical potential. In the spectra with the phenomenological deep kaon--nucleus potential, we may have possibilities …
We review recent work on various topics related to the modification of kaon properties in nuclei. After a brief exposition of the kaon-nucleon and kaon-nucleus interaction, results from the application to kaonic atoms, renormalization of the f0 and a0 scalar resonances in nuclei and phi decay in the nucleus are shown.
Strong interaction level shifts and widths in $Σ^-$ atoms are analyzed by using a $Σ$ nucleus optical potential constructed within the relativistic mean field approach. The analysis leads to potentials with a repulsive real part in the nuclear interior. The data are sufficient to establish the size of the isovector meson--hyperon coupling. Implications to $Σ$ hypernuclei are discussed.
When an atom is placed into an oscillating electric field with frequency far from atomic resonances, the atomic electrons partly shield this field at the nucleus. It is conjectured that when the frequency of electric field reaches an atomic resonance, the electric field at the nucleus may be significantly enhanced. In this paper, we systematically study the mechanisms of this enhancement and show that it may reach five orders in magnitude in particular cases. As an application, we consider laser-assisted neutron capture in 139-Lanthanum nucleus and screening and resonance enhancement of nuclea…
The spin symmetry of anti-Lambda spectrum in nucleus $^{16}$O has been studied in the relativistic mean field theory. The spin-orbit splittings of spin doublets are found to be around 0.03-0.07 MeV and the dominant components of the Dirac spinor for the anti-Lambda spin doublets are found to be near identical. It indicates that there is an even better spin symmetry in the anti-Lambda spectrum than that in the anti-nucleon spectrum.
Event-by-event multiplicity fluctuations in central C+C, S+S, In+In, and Pb+Pb as well as p+p collisions at bombarding energies from 10 to 160 AGeV are studied within the HSD and UrQMD microscopic transport approaches. Our investigation is directly related to the future experimental program of the NA61 Collaboration at the SPS for a search of the QCD critical point. The dependence on energy and atomic mass number of the scaled variances for negative, positive, and all charged hadrons is presented and compared to the results of the model of independent sources. Furthermore, the nucleus-nucleus …
The connection of synthesis of long-lived superheavy nuclei and existence of the island of stability with the choice of realistic nuclear potential is discussed: the behaviour of the average field of nuclei is an important element of nuclear models. It is also shown that it is just Dubna that possesses the priority both in the recent synthesis of a superheavy nucleus with charge Z=114 and in its theoretical prediction made 35 years ago. Possible sizes of the island of stability of superheavy nuclei are considered.
The $K^-$-nucleus optical potential is revisited to investigate its global feature phenomenologically. It is a puzzle that the energy shift is found to be repulsive in all of the observed kaonic atom, although the $K^-N$ interaction is known to be so attractive as to form the $Λ(1405)$ resonance. To solve this puzzle, we examine the $K^-$ optical potential in the linear density approximation and determine the potential parameters of each kaonic atom so as to reproduce the observed energy shift and absorption width. We find two types of the potentials. One potential has a so large real part as …
$K^-$ atomic data are used to test several models of the $K^-$ nucleus interaction. The t($ρ$)$ρ$ optical potential, due to coupled channel models incorporating the $Λ$(1405) dynamics, fails to reproduce these data. A standard relativistic mean field (RMF) potential, disregarding the $Λ$(1405) dynamics at low densities, also fails. The only successful model is a hybrid of a theoretically motivated RMF approach in the nuclear interior and a completely phenomenological density dependent potential, which respects the low density theorem in the nuclear surface region. This best-fit $K^-$ optical p…
A phenomenological analysis of diffractive dissociation of nuclei in proton-nucleus and meson-nucleus collisions is presented. The theoretical approach employed here is able to take into account at once data of the HELIOS and EHS/NA22 collaborations that exhibit quite different atomic mass dependences. Possible extensions of this approach to hard diffraction in nuclear processes are also discussed.
According to the Schiff theorem an external electric field vanishes at atomic nucleus in a neutral atom, i.e. it is completely shielded by electrons. This makes a nuclear electric dipole moment (EDM) unobservable. In this paper an extension of the Schiff theorem to an oscillating electric field is considered. Such field can reach the nucleus and interact with the nuclear EDM. The enhancement effect appears if the field is in resonance with atomic or molecular transition. The shielding by electrons strongly affects low-energy nuclear electric dipole transition amplitudes in different nuclear re…
The nonbaryonic dark matter of the Universe is assumed to consist of new stable particles. A specific case is possible, when new stable particles bear ordinary electric charge and bind in heavy "atoms" by ordinary Coulomb interaction. Such possibility is severely restricted by the constraints on anomalous isotopes of light elements that form positively charged heavy species with ordinary electrons. The trouble is avoided, if stable particles $X^{--}$ with charge -2 are in excess over their antiparticles (with charge +2) and there are no stable particles with charges +1 and -1. Then primordial …
The work deals with one of the topics of collective motion. In the frame of Nuclear Fluid Dynamics, a model which portrays the nuclear matter as a quantum elastic body, the torus-like motions and their associated energies are computed using the thirteen moment approximation. The spin-dependent collective excitations, with toroidal electromagnetic structure, are studied by means of the Generalized Goldhaber-Teller model, with emphasize on the 1$^{-}$ spin-flip mode and its excitation in spherical nuclei by inelastic electron scattering. We discuss the importance of toroidal contributions in the…
We study a production of Coulomb-assisted $Σ^-$-nucleus bound states by nuclear ($K^-$, $π^+$) reactions within a distorted-wave impulse approximation, so as to examine several types of the $Σ$-nucleus potentials that are consistent with the available $Σ^-$ atomic X-ray data and nuclear ($π^-$, $K^+$) data. We theoretically demonstrate the inclusive ($K^-$, $π^+$) spectra of the $Σ^-$ unstable bound states on $^{28}$Si, $^{58}$Ni, and $^{208}$Pb targets at incident $K^-$ lab momenta $p_{K}= 400\text{--}800$ MeV/c. The results show that the near-recoilless ($K^-$, $π^+$) reaction on the $^{58}$…
We report a quantum simulation of the deuteron binding energy on quantum processors accessed via cloud servers. We use a Hamiltonian from pionless effective field theory at leading order. We design a low-depth version of the unitary coupled-cluster ansatz, use the variational quantum eigensolver algorithm, and compute the binding energy to within a few percent. Our work is the first step towards scalable nuclear structure computations on a quantum processor via the cloud, and it sheds light on how to map scientific computing applications onto nascent quantum devices.
The charge-dependent realistic nuclear Hamiltonian for a nucleus, composed of neutrons and protons, can be successfully approximated by a charge-independent one. The parameters of such a Hamiltonian, i.e., the nucleon mass and the NN potential, depend upon the mass number A, charge Z and isospin quantum number T of state of the studied nucleus.
Predictions of the existence of well-defined deeply bound pionic atom states for heavy nuclei and the eventual observation of such states by the (d,3He) reaction have revived interest in the pion-nucleus interaction at threshold and in its relation to the corresponding pion-nucleon interaction. Explanation of the 'anomalous' s-wave repulsion in terms of partial restoration of chiral symmetry and/or in terms of energy-dependence effects have been tested in global fits to pionic atom data and in a recent dedicated elastic scattering experiment. The role of neutron density distributions in this c…
In nuclear physics, the relativistic mean-field theory describes the nucleus as a system of Dirac nucleons which interact via meson fields. In a static case and without nonlinear self-coupling of the $σ$ meson, the relativistic mean-field equations become a system of Dirac equations where the potential is given by the meson and photon fields. The aim of this work is to prove the existence of solutions of these equations. We consider a minimization problem with constraints that involve negative spectral projectors and we apply the concentration-compactness lemma to find a minimizer of this prob…
