With partially restored isospin symmetry, we calculate the nuclear matrix element for a special decay mode of $2νββ$ (two neutrino double beta decay) -- the decay to the first $2^+$ excited states. With the realistic CD-Bonn nuclear force, we analyze the dependence of the nuclear matrix elements on the iso-vector and iso-scalar parts of proton-neutron particle-particle interaction. The dependence on the different nuclear matrix element is observed and the results are explained. We also give the phase space factors with numerical electron wave functions and properly chosen excitation energies. Finally we give our results for the half-lives of this decay mode for different nuclei.
The recently proposed Fully-Renormalized QRPA (FR-QRPA), which fullfils the Ikeda sum rule (ISR) exactly, is applied to the two-neutrino double beta decay of $^{76}$Ge, $^{82}$Se, $^{100}$Mo, $^{116}$Cd, $^{128}$Te and $^{130}$Xe. The results obtained are compared with those of other approaches, standard QRPA and self-consistent QRPA (SCQRPA). The similarities and the differences among the methods are discussed. The influence of the restoration of the Ikeda sum rule on the $2νββ$-decay amplitude is analyzed.
The one-QRPA method is used to describe simultaneously both double decay beta modes, giving special attention to the partial restoration of spin-isospin SU(4) symmetry. To implement this restoration and to fix the model parameters, we resort to the energetics of Gamow-Teller resonances and to the minima of the single $β^+$-decay strengths. This makes the theory predictive regarding the $ββ_{2ν}$-decay, producing the $2ν$ moments in $^{48}$Ca, $^{76}$Ge, $^{82}$Se, $^{96}$Zr, $^{100}$Mo, $^{128,130}$Te, and $^{150}$Nd, that are of the same order of magnitude as the experimental ones; however, t…
Within QRPA we achieve partial restoration of the isospin symmetry and hence fulfillment of the requirement that the $2νββ$ Fermi matrix element $M^{2ν}_F$ vanishes, as it should, unlike in the previous version of the method. This is accomplished by separating the renormalization parameter $g_{pp}$ of the particle-particle proton-neutron interaction into the isovector and isoscalar parts. The isovector parameter $g_{pp}^{T=1}$ need to be chosen to be essentially equal to the pairing constant $g_{pair}$, so no new parameter is needed. For the $0νββ$ decay the Fermi matrix element $M^{0ν}_F$ is …
An isospin-selfconsistent pn-continuum-QRPA approach is formulated and applied to describe the Gamow-Teller strength distributions for $ββ$-decaying open-shell nuclei. The calculation results obtained for the pairs of nuclei $^{76}$Ge-Se, $^{100}$Mo-Ru, $^{116}$Cd-Sn, and $^{130}$Te-Xe are compared with available experimental data.
A selfconsistent approach based on a deformed HF+BCS+QRPA method with density-dependent Skyrme forces is used to describe beta+ decay properties in even-even deformed proton rich nuclei. Residual spin-isospin forces are included in the particle-hole and particle-particle channels. The quasiparticle basis contains neutron-neutron and proton-proton pairing correlations in the BCS approach, while neutron-proton pairing interaction is treated as a residual force in QRPA. We discuss the sensitivity of Gamow-Teller strength distributions and beta+/EC half-lives to deformation, pairing and the streng…
The transition matrix elements for the $0^{+}\to 0^{+}$ double beta decays are calculated for $^{48}Ca$, $^{76}Ge $, $^{82}Se$, $^{100}Mo$, $^{128}Te$ and $^{130}Te$ nuclei, using a $δ$-interaction. As a guide, to fix the particle-particle interaction strengths, we exploit the fact that the missing symmetries of the mean field approximation are restored in the random phase approximation by the residual interaction. Thus, the T=1, S=0 and T=0, S=1 coupling strengths have been estimated by invoking the partial restoration of the isospin and Wigner SU(4) symmetries, respectively. When this recipe…
In this work, with restored isospin symmetry, we evaluated the neutrinoless double beta decay nuclear matrix elements for $^{76}$Ge, $^{82}$Se, $^{130}$Te, $^{136}$Xe and $^{150}$Nd for both the light and heavy neutrino mass mechanisms using the deformed QRPA approach with realistic forces. We give detailed decompositions of the nuclear matrix elements over different intermediate states and nucleon pairs, and discuss how these decompositions are affected by the model space truncations. Compared to the spherical calculations, our results show reductions from $30\%$ to about $60\%$ of the nuclea…
We study Fermi transitions and isospin mixing in an isotopic chain 70-78 Kr considering various approximations that use the same Skyrme-Hartree-Fock single particle basis. We study Coulomb effects as well as the effect of BCS and quasiparticle random phase approximation (QRPA) correlations. A measure of isospin mixing in the approximate ground state is defined by means of the expectation value of the isospin operator squared in N=Z nuclei (which is generalized to N different from Z nuclei). Starting from strict Hartree-Fock approach without Coulomb, it is shown that the isospin breaking is neg…
Beta decay and electron capture on isotopes of chromium are advocated to play a key role in the stellar evolution process. In this paper we endeavor to study charge-changing transitions for 24 isotopes of chromium ($^{42-65}$Cr). These include neutron-rich and neutron-deficient isotopes of chromium. Three different models from the QRPA genre, namely the pn-QRPA, the Pyatov method (PM) and the Schematic model (SM), were selected to calculate and study the Gamow-Teller (GT) transitions in chromium isotopes. The SM was employed separately in the particle-particle ($pp$) and $pp$ + particle-hole (…
We study Gamow-Teller strength distributions of 76Ge and 76Se within a deformed QRPA formalism, which includes residual spin-isospin forces in the particle-hole and particle-particle channels. We consider two different methods to construct the quasiparticle basis, a selfconsistent approach based on a deformed Hartree-Fock calculation with density-dependent Skyrme forces and a more phenomenological approach based on a deformed Woods-Saxon potential. Both methods contain pairing correlations in the BCS approach. We discuss the sensitivity of Gamow-Teller strength distributions to the deformed me…
Isospin symmetry of atomic nuclei is explicitly broken by the charge-dependent interactions, primarily the Coulomb force. Within the nuclear density functional theory, isospin is also broken spontaneously. We propose a projection scheme rooted in a mean field theory, that allows the consistent treatment of isospin breaking in both ground and exited nuclear states. We demonstrate that this scheme is essentially free from spurious divergences plaguing particle-number and angular-momentum restoration approaches. Applications of the new technique include excited high-spin states in medium-mass N=Z…
We introduce a method for isospin restoration in the calculation of nuclear matrix elements (NME) for $0νββ$ and $2νββ$ decay within the framework of interacting boson model (IBM-2). With this method, we calculate NME for all processes of interest in $0νβ^-β^-$, $2νβ^-β^-$, and in $0νβ^+β^+$, $0νβ^+ EC^+$, $R0νECEC$, $2νβ^+β^+$, $2νβ^+EC$, and $2νECEC$. With this method, the Fermi (F) matrix elements for $2νββ$ vanish, and those for $0νββ$ are considerably reduced.
In this work, we calculate the matrix elements of $0νββ$-decay of $^{150}$Nd with the deformed pn-QRPA method. We adopted the approach introduced by Rodin, Faessler [Phys. Rev. C84, 014322 (2011)] and Simkovic {\it et. al.} [Phys. Rev. C87,045501(2013)] to restore the isospin symmetry by enforcing $M^{2ν}_F=0$. We found that with this restoration, the Fermi matrix elements are reduced by about 30\% while the more important Gamow-Teller matrix elements remains the same. The results of an enlarged model space is also presented, which changes the matrix elements by less than 10\%.
Symmetry restoration in the axially deformed proton-neutron quasiparticle random phase approximation for nuclear beta decay: The effect of angular-momentum projection
Sun Yat-sen University（中山大学）；University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill（北卡罗来纳大学教堂山分校）
Explicit relations between the isospin mixing probability, the spreading width $Γ_{IAS}^{\downarrow}$ of the Isobaric Analog State (IAS) and the statistical decay width $Γ_c$ of the compound nucleus at finite excitation energy, are derived by using the Feshbach projection formalism. The temperature dependence of the isospin mixing probability is discussed quantitatively for the first time by using the values of $Γ_{IAS}^{\downarrow}$ and of $Γ_c$ calculated by means of microscopic models. It is shown that the mixing probability remains essentially constant up to a temperature of the order of 1…
The effect of the inclusion of ground state correlations into the QRPA equation of motion for the two-neutrino double beta ($ββ_{2ν}$) decay is carefully analyzed. The resulting model, called renormalized QRPA (RQRPA), does not collapse near the physical value of the nuclear force strength in the particle-particle channel, as happens with the ordinary QRPA. Still, the $ββ_{2ν}$ transition amplitude is only slightly less sensitive on this parameter in the RQRPA than that in the plain QRPA. It is argued that this fact reveals once more that the characteristic behaviour of the $ββ_{2ν}$ transitio…
Our paper aims at providing an answer to the question whether one can reliably describe the properties of the most important spin-isospin nuclear excitations, by using the available non-relativistic Skyrme energy functionals. Our method, which has been introduced in a previous publication devoted to the Isobaric Analog states, is the self-consistent Quasiparticle Random Phase Approximation (QRPA). The inclusion of pairing is instrumental for describing a number of experimentally measured spherical systems which are characterized by open shells. We discuss the effect of isoscalar and isovector …
We use a deformed QRPA formalism to describe simultaneously the energy distributions of the single beta Gamow-Teller strength and the two-neutrino double beta decay matrix elements. Calculations are performed in a series of double beta decay partners with A = 48, 76, 82, 96, 100, 116, 128, 130, 136 and 150, using deformed Woods-Saxon potentials and deformed Skyrme Hartree-Fock mean fields. The formalism includes a quasiparticle deformed basis and residual spin-isospin forces in the particle-hole and particle-particle channels. We discuss the sensitivity of the parent and daughter Gamow-Teller …
We treat proton-neutron pairing amplitudes, in addition to the nuclear deformation, as generator coordinates in a calculation of the neutrinoless double-beta decay of 76Ge. We work in two oscillator shells, with a Hamiltonian that includes separable terms in the quadrupole, spin-isospin, and pairing (isovector and isoscalar) channels. Our approach allows larger single-particle spaces than the shell model and includes the important physics of the proton-neutron quasiparticle random-phase approximation (QRPA) without instabilities near phase transitions. After comparing the results of a simplifi…
We study a spectral function for $\bar{D}_0^*$ $(0^+)$ meson in symmetric and neutron-rich asymmetric nuclear matter from the viewpoint of the partial restoration of chiral symmetry. Nuclear matter is constructed by a parity doublet model with hidden local symmetry which can reproduce properties at normal nuclear matter density as well as those in the vacuum. $\bar{D}$ mesons are introduced by the chiral partner structure. Our results show that a mass of $\bar{D}$ ($0^-$) meson increases while a mass of $\bar{D}_0^*$ meson decreases at mean field level as we increase the baryon density, reflec…
The self-consistent quasiparticle random-phase approximation (QRPA) approach is formulated in the canonical single-nucleon basis of the relativistic Hatree-Fock-Bogoliubov (RHFB) theory. This approach is applied to study the isobaric analog states (IAS) and Gamov-Teller resonances (GTR) by taking Sn isotopes as examples. It is found that self-consistent treatment of the particle-particle residual interaction is essential to concentrate the IAS in a single peak for open-shell nuclei and the Coulomb exchange term is very important to predict the IAS energies. For the GTR, the isovector pairing c…
We show that the symmetry-restored paired mean-field states (quasiparticle vacua) properly account for isoscalar versus isovector nuclear pairing properties. Full particle-number, spin, and isospin symmetries are restored in a simple SO(8) proton-neutron pairing model, and prospects to implement a similar approach in a realistic setting are delineated. Our results show that, provided all symmetries are restored, the pictures based on pair-condensate and quartet-condensate wave functions represent equivalent ways of looking at the physics of nuclear proton-neutron pairing.
A cranked shell model approach for the description of rotational bands in $N\approx Z$ nuclei is formulated. The isovector neutron-proton pairing is taken into account explicitly. The concept of spontaneous breaking and subsequent restoration of the isospin symmetry turns out to be crucial. The general rules to construct the near yrast-spectra for rotating nuclei are presented. For the model case of particles in a j-shell, it is shown that excitation spectra and the alignment processes are well described as compared to the exact shell model calculation. Realistic cranked shell model calculatio…
Intimate relation between the Gamow-Teller part of the matrix element $M^{0ν}_\mathrm{GT}$ and the $2νββ$ closure matrix element $M^{2ν}_\mathrm{cl}$ is explained and explored. If the corresponding radial dependence $C^{2ν}_\mathrm{cl}(r)$ would be known, $M^{0ν}$ corresponding to any mechanism responsible for the $0νββ$ decay can be obtained as a simple integral. However, the $M^{2ν}_\mathrm{cl}$ values sensitively depend on the properties of higher lying $1^+$ states in the intermediate odd-odd nuclei. We show that the $β^-$ and $β^+$ amplitudes of such states typically have opposite relativ…
In the present work the sensitivity of the QRPA calculation results to a realistic residual interaction is analyzed in the framework of the approach of Refs. \cite{Rum98,Rodin05}. Both Gamow-Teller (GT) and Fermi (F) \bb-decay amplitudes $M^{2ν}$, along with the corresponding energy-weighted sum rules $S$, are calculated. General expressions relating $S$ to a realistic residual particle-particle interaction are derived, which show a pronounced sensitivity of $S$ to the singlet-channel interaction in the case of F transitions, and to the triplet-channel interaction in the case of GT transitions…
We study Gamow-Teller strength distributions in the neutron-deficient even isotopes (184-194)Pb in a search for signatures of deformation. The microscopic formalism used is based on a deformed quasiparticle random phase approximation (QRPA) approach, which involves a self-consistent quasiparticle deformed Skyrme Hartree-Fock (HF) basis and residual spin-isospin forces in both the particle-hole and particle-particle channels. By analyzing the sensitivity of the Gamow-Teller strength distributions to the various ingredients in the formalism, we conclude that the beta-decay of these isotopes coul…
Nuclear magnetic-dipole (M1) and Gamow-Teller (GT) transitions provide insight into the spin-isospin properties of atomic nuclei. By considering them as unified spin-isospin transitions, the M1/GT transition strengths and excitation energies are subject to isospin symmetry. The excitation properties associated to the M1/GT symmetry need to be clarified within consistent theoretical approach. In this work, the relationship between the M1 and GT transitions in Ca isotopes is investigated in a unified framework based on the relativistic energy-density functional (REDF) with point-coupling interac…
Motivated by our earlier findings of sensitive quark-flavor dependence of QCD topological susceptibility on products of current quark masses and corresponding condensates, we allow the breaking of isospin symmetry. For the purpose of future investigations of U_A(1) symmetry breaking and restoration at T > 0, we perform (at T = 0) refitting of the quark-mass parameters of a phenomenologically successful effective model of low-energy QCD. It belongs to the class of separable-interaction models within the Dyson-Schwinger approach to the quark-antiquark substructure of mesons.
We extend the Polyakov-loop extended Nambu-Jona-Lasinio (PNJL) model by introducing an effective four-quark vertex depending on Polyakov loop. The effective vertex generates entanglement interactions between Polyakov loop and chiral condensate. The new model is consistent with lattice QCD data at imaginary quark-number chemical potential and real and imaginary isospin chemical potentials, particularly on strong correlation between the chiral and deconfinement transitions and also on the quark-mass dependence of the order of the Roberge-Weiss endpoint predicted by lattice QCD very lately. We in…
Theoretical analysis and predictions for the double electron capture of $^{124}$Xe
Comenius University in Bratislava（布拉迪斯拉发康斯坦丁神学家大学）；International Centre for Advanced Training and Research in Physics（高级培训与物理研究中心）；“Horia Hulubei” National Institute of Physics and Nuclear Engineering（霍里亚·胡卢贝伊国家物理与核工程研究所）；University of Bucharest（布加勒斯特大学）；Central Michigan University（中密歇根大学）；Czech Technical University in Prague（捷克理工大学）
We construct the most general nonlinear representation of chiral SU(2)_L x SU(2)_R broken down spontaneously to the isospin SU(2), on a pair of hadrons of same spin and isospin and opposite parity. We show that any such representation is equivalent, through a hadron field transformation, to two irreducible representations on two hadrons of opposite parity with different masses and axial couplings. This implies that chiral symmetry realized in the Nambu-Goldstone mode does not predict the existence of degenerate multiplets of hadrons of opposite parity nor any relations between their couplings …
We review several experimental and theoretical advances that emphasise common aspects of the study of T=1 and T=0 pairing correlations in nuclei. We first discuss several empirical evidences of the special role played by the T=1 pairing interaction. In particular, we show the peculiar features of the nuclear pairing interaction in the low density regime, and possible outcomes such as the BCS-BEC crossover in nuclear matter and, in an analogous way, in loosely bound nuclei. We then move to the competition between T=1 and T=0 pairing correlations. The effect of such competition on the low-lying …
The effect of conserved baryon, isospin and strangeness charges on the behavior of phase transitions in dense matter is studied. Baryonic matter is described within the three-flavor Polyakov$-$Nambu$-$Jona-Lasinio model and several charge fractions $Y_Q$ are considered. The role of the vector interaction, which can be important to describe dense systems, is discussed. Special attention is given to the case with charge fraction $Y_Q=0.4$, due to its importance in heavy-ion collisions and core-collapse supernova matter. It is shown that the possible formation of chiral-symmetric quark matter in …
The temperature ($T$) dependence of the axion mass is predicted for $T$'s up to $\sim 2.3 \times$ the chiral restoration temperature of QCD. The axion is related to the $U_A(1)$ anomaly. The squared axion mass $m_a(T)^2$ is, modulo the presently undetermined scale of spontaneous breaking of Peccei-Quinn symmetry $f_a$ (squared), equal to QCD topological susceptibility $χ(T)$ for all $T$. We obtain $χ(T)$ by using quark condensates calculated in two effective Dyson-Schwinger models of nonperturbative QCD. They exhibit the correct chiral behavior, including the dynamical breaking of chiral symme…
The first attempt is made to provide a quantitative theoretical interpretation of the WASA-at-COSY experimental data on the basic double-pion production reactions $pn \to d π^0π^0$ and $pn \to d π^+π^-$ in the energy region $T_p =1$ - $1.3$ GeV [P. Adlarson et al., Phys. Lett. B 721, 229 (2013)]. The data are analyzed within a model based on production and decay of an intermediate $I(J^P)=0(3^+)$ dibaryon resonance $\mathcal{D}_{03}$ (denoted also as $d^*(2380)$). The observed decrease of the near-threshold enhancement (the so-called ABC effect) in the reaction $pn \to d π^+π^-$ in comparison …
The confining quark matter (CQM) model, in which the confinement and asymptotic freedom are modeled via the Richardson potential for quark-quark vector interaction and the chiral symmetry restoration at high density is described by the density dependent quark mass, is extended to include isospin dependence of the quark mass. Within this extended isospin-dependent confining quark matter (ICQM) model, we study the properties of strange quark matter and quark stars. We find that including isospin dependence of the quark mass can significantly influence the quark matter symmetry energy, the stabil…
In this work we present the first beyond closure calculation for the neutrinoless double beta decay ($0νββ$) of $^{76}$Ge to the first $2^+$ states of $^{76}$Se. The isospin symmetry restored Quasi-particle random phase approximation (QRPA) method with the CD-Bonn realistic force is adopted for the nuclear structure calculations. We analyze the structure of the two nucleon mechanism nuclear matrix elements, and estimate the uncertainties from the nuclear many-body calculations. We find $g_{pp}$ plays an important role for the calculations and if quenching is included, suppression for the trans…
Using in-medium hadron properties according to the Brown-Rho scaling due to the chiral symmetry restoration at high densities and considering naturalness of the coupling constants, we have newly constructed several relativistic mean-field Lagrangians with chiral limits. The model parameters are adjusted such that the symmetric part of the resulting equation of state at supra-normal densities is consistent with that required by the collective flow data from high energy heavy-ion reactions, while the resulting density dependence of the symmetry energy at sub-saturation densities agrees with that…
We discuss two models for describing the behavior of matter at large densities and intermediate temperatures. In both models a softening of the equation of state takes place due to the appearance of new degrees of freedom. The first is a hadronic model in which the softening is due to chiral symmetry restoration. In the second model the softening is associated with the formation of clusters of quarks in the mixed phase. We show that both models allow a significant softening but, in the first case the bulk modulus is mainly dependent on the density, while in the mixed phase model it also strong…
The feasibility of shell-model calculations is radically extended by the Quantum Monte Carlo Diagonalization method with various essential improvements. The major improvements are made in the sampling for the generation of shell-model basis vectors, and in the restoration of symmetries such as angular momentum and isospin. Consequently the level structure of low-lying states can be studied with realistic interactions. After testing this method on $^{24}$Mg, we present first results for energy levels and $E2$ properties of $^{64}$Ge, indicating its large and $γ$-soft deformation.
For studies of quark matter in astrophysical scenarios the thermodynamic bag model (tdBag) is commonly employed. Although successful, it does not account for dynamical chiral symmetry breaking (D$χ$SB) and repulsions due to the vector interaction which is crucial to explain recent observations of massive, two solar mass neutron stars. In Klähn & Fischer (2015) we developed the novel vBag quark matter model which takes these effects into account. This article extends vBag to finite temperatures and isospin asymmetry. Another particular feature of vBag is the determination of the deconfinement b…
The two-neutrino double-$β$ Gamow-Teller and Fermi transitions are studied within an exactly solvable model, which allows a violation of both spin-isospin SU(4) and isospin SU(2) symmetries, and is expressed with generators of the SO(8) group. It is found that this model reproduces the main features of realistic calculation within the quasiparticle random-phase approximation with isospin symmetry restoration concerning the dependence of the two-neutrino double-$β$ decay matrix elements on isovector and isoscalar particle-particle interactions. By using perturbation theory an explicit dependenc…
The finite temperature and finite density dependence of the neutron-proton mass difference is analysed in a purely hadronic framework where the $ρ-ω$ mixing is crucial for this isospin symmetry breakdown. The problem is handled within Thermo Field Dynamics. The present results, consistent with partial chiral and charge symmetry restoration, improve the experimental data fit for the energy difference between mirror nuclei.
After briefly reviewing $ββ$ decay as a test of the neutrino mass, I examine the nuclear structure involved in this process. Simple formulas (à la Padé) are designed for the transition amplitudes and the general behavior of $ββ$ decay amplitudes in the quasiparticle random phase approximation are discussed. Results of a calculation for $^{48}Ca$, $^{76}Ge $, $^{82}Se$, $^{100}Mo$, $^{128}Te$ and $^{130}Te$ nuclei are presented, in which the particle-particle interaction strengths have been fixed by invoking the partial restoration of the isospin and Wigner SU(4) symmetries. An upper limit of $…
We investigate the (partial) chiral restoration at finite temperature (T) under the strong external magnetic field B_0 of the SU(2) light-flavor QCD matter. To this end, we employ the instanton-liquid QCD vacuum configuration accompanied with the linear Schwinger method for inducing the magnetic field. The Harrington-Shepard caloron solution is used to modify the instanton parameters, i.e. the average instanton size (rho) and inter-instanton distance (R), as functions of T. In addition, we include the meson-loop corrections (MLC) as the large-N_c corrections because they are critical for repro…
The mean-field approximation based on effective interactions or density functionals plays a pivotal role in the description of finite quantum many-body systems that are too large to be treated by ab initio methods. Some examples are strongly interacting medium and heavy mass atomic nuclei and mesoscopic condensed matter systems. In this approach, the linear Schrodinger equation for the exact many-body wave function is mapped onto a non-linear density-dependent one-body potential problem. This approximation, not only provides computationally very simple solutions even for systems with many part…
An improved formalism of the two-neutrino double-beta decay ($2νββ$-decay) rate is presented, which takes into account the dependence of energy denominators on lepton energies via the Taylor expansion. Till now, only the leading term in this expansion has been considered. The revised $2νββ$-decay rate and differential characteristics depend on additional phase-space factors weighted by the ratios of $2νββ$-decay nuclear matrix elements with different powers of the energy denominator. For nuclei of experimental interest all phase-space factors are calculated by using exact Dirac wave functions …
We explore how the $η$-$π^0$ mixing angle and the $η$ meson decay into $π^{+}π^{-}π^0$ and 3$π^{0}$ are modified in the nuclear medium on the basis of the in-medium chiral effective theory with the isospin asymmetry $α$ varied, where $α\equiv δρ/ρ$ with $δρ=ρ_n-ρ_p$ and $ρ=ρ_n+ρ_p$. We find that the larger the isospin asymmetry $δρ$ and smaller the total density $ρ$, the more enhanced the mixing angle. We show that the decay width in the nuclear medium has an additional density dependence which cannot be renormalized into that of the mixing angle: The additional term originates from the vertex…
Functional renormalization group (FRG) methods applied to calculations of isospin-symmetric and asymmetric nuclear matter as well as neutron matter are reviewed. The approach is based on a chiral Lagrangian expressed in terms of nucleon and meson degrees of freedom as appropriate for the hadronic phase of QCD with spontaneously broken chiral symmetry. Fluctuations beyond mean-field approximation are treated solving Wetterich's FRG flow equations. Nuclear thermodynamics and the nuclear liquid-gas phase transition are investigated in detail, both in symmetric matter and as a function of the prot…
