Efficacy of the SU(3) scheme for ab initio large-scale calculations beyond the lightest nuclei

We report on the computational characteristics of ab initio nuclear structure calculations in a symmetry-adapted no-core shell model (SA-NCSM) framework. We examine the computational complexity of the current implementation of the SA-NCSM approach, dubbed LSU3shell, by analyzing ab initio results for 6Li and 12C in large harmonic oscillator model spaces and SU(3)-selected subspaces. We demonstrate LSU3shell's strong-scaling properties achieved with highly-parallel methods for computing the many-body matrix elements. Results compare favorably with complete model space calculations and significant memory savings are achieved in physically important applications. In particular, a well-chosen symmetry-adapted basis affords memory savings in calculations of states with a fixed total angular momentum in large model spaces while exactly preserving translational invariance.Comment: 11 pages, 8 figure

Emergence of cluster structures and collectivity within a no-core shell-model framework

An innovative symmetry-guided concept, which capitalizes on partial as well as exact symmetries that underpin the structure of nuclei, is discussed. Within this framework, ab initio applications of the theory to light nuclei reveal the origin of collective modes and the emergence a simple orderly pattern from first principles. This provides a strategy for determining the nature of bound states of nuclei in terms of a relatively small fraction of the complete shell-model space, which, in turn, can be used to explore ultra-large model spaces for a description of alpha-cluster and highly deformed structures together with the associated rotations. We find that by using only a fraction of the model space extended far beyond current no-core shell-model limits and a long-range interaction that respects the symmetries in play, the outcome reproduces characteristic features of the low-lying 0+ states in 12 C (including the elusive Hoyle state and its 2+ excitation) and agrees with ab initio results in smaller spaces. This is achieved by selecting those particle configurations and components of the interaction found to be foremost responsible for the primary physics governing clustering phenomena and large spatial deformation in the ground-state and Hoyle-state rotational bands of 12 C. For these states, we offer a novel perspective emerging out of no-core shell-model considerations, including a discussion of associated nuclear deformation, matter radii, and density distribution. The framework we find is also extensible to negative-parity states (e.g., the 3-1 state in 12C) and beyond, namely, to the low-lying 0+ states of 8Be as well as the ground-state rotational band of Ne, Mg, and Si isotopes. The findings inform key features of the nuclear interaction and point to a new insight into the formation of highly-organized simple patterns in nuclear dynamics

Response functions and giant monopole resonances for light to medium-mass nuclei from the \textit{ab initio} symmetry-adapted no-core shell model

Using the \textit{ab initio} symmetry-adapted no-core shell model, we compute sum rules and response functions for light to medium-mass nuclei, starting from interactions that are derived in the chiral effective field theory. We investigate electromagnetic transitions of monopole, dipole and quadrupole nature for symmetric nuclei such as $^4$He, $^{16}$O, $^{20}$Ne and $^{40}$Ca. Furthermore, we study giant monopole resonance, which can provide information on the incompressibility of symmetric nuclear matter

Similarity renormalization group and many-body effects in multiparticle systems

The similarity renormalization group (SRG), based on the simple one-body free harmonic oscillator Hamiltonian, is applied to various nucleon-nucleon realistic interactions to investigate the unitarity of the SRG transformations. Two-body and three-body contributions to the SRG-evolved Hamiltonian are studied in the framework of spectral distribution theory for reasonable SRG cutoffs and in multiparticle systems, with up through 28 particles considered. The outcome points to the first evidence for the overall importance of three-body SRG-induced interactions and especially, of its two-body effective content in multinucleon systems, without the need for large-scale shell model calculations for many light to heavier nuclei. © 2012 American Physical Society

Symmetry-guided large-scale shell-model theory

In this review, we present a symmetry-guided strategy that utilizes exact as well as partial symmetries for enabling a deeper understanding of and advancing ab initio studies for determining the microscopic structure of atomic nuclei. These symmetries expose physically relevant degrees of freedom that, for large-scale calculations with QCD-inspired interactions, allow the model space size to be reduced through a very structured selection of the basis states to physically relevant subspaces. This can guide explorations of simple patterns in nuclei and how they emerge from first principles, as well as extensions of the theory beyond current limitations toward heavier nuclei and larger model spaces. This is illustrated for the ab initio symmetry-adapted no-core shell model (SA-NCSM) and two significant underlying symmetries, the symplectic Sp(3,R) group and its deformation-related SU(3) subgroup. We review the broad scope of nuclei, where these symmetries have been found to play a key role - from the light p-shell systems, such as 6Li, 8B, 8Be, 12C, and 16O, and sd-shell nuclei exemplified by 20Ne, based on first-principle explorations; through the Hoyle state in 12C and enhanced collectivity in intermediate-mass nuclei, within a no-core shell-model perspective; up to strongly deformed species of the rare-earth and actinide regions, as investigated in earlier studies. A complementary picture, driven by symmetries dual to Sp(3,R), is also discussed. We briefly review symmetry-guided techniques that prove useful in various nuclear-theory models, such as Elliott model, ab initio SA-NCSM, symplectic model, pseudo-SU(3) and pseudo-symplectic models, ab initio hyperspherical harmonics method, ab initio lattice effective field theory, exact pairing-plus-shell model approaches, and cluster models, including the resonating-group method. Important implications of these approaches that have deepened our understanding of emergent phenomena in nuclei, such as enhanced collectivity, giant resonances, pairing, halo, and clustering, are discussed, with a focus on emergent patterns in the framework of the ab initio SA-NCSM with no a priori assumptions

Issues and Opportunities in Exotic Hadrons

The last few years have been witness to a proliferation of new results concerning heavy exotic hadrons. Experimentally, many new signals have been discovered that could be pointing towards the existence of tetraquarks, pentaquarks, and other exotic configurations of quarks and gluons. Theoretically, advances in lattice field theory techniques place us at the cusp of understanding complex coupled-channel phenomena, modelling grows more sophisticated, and effective field theories are being applied to an ever greater range of situations. It is thus an opportune time to evaluate the status of the field. In the following, a series of high priority experimental and theoretical issues concerning heavy exotic hadrons is presented.Comment: White paper from INT workshop, "Modern Exotic Hadrons". References added. Version to appear in Chinese Physics

Hadrons and Nuclei

This document is one of a series of whitepapers from the USQCD collaboration. Here, we discuss opportunities for lattice QCD calculations related to the structure and spectroscopy of hadrons and nuclei. An overview of recent lattice calculations of the structure of the proton and other hadrons is presented along with prospects for future extensions. Progress and prospects of hadronic spectroscopy and the study of resonances in the light, strange and heavy quark sectors is summarized. Finally, recent advances in the study of light nuclei from lattice QCD are addressed, and the scope of future investigations that are currently envisioned is outlined.Comment: 45 page

Transformation of a nucleon-nucleon potential operator into its su(3) tensor form using GPUS

Starting from the matrix elements of a nucleon-nucleon potential operator provided in a basis of spherical harmonic oscillator functions, we present an algorithm for expressing a given potential operator in terms of irreducible tensors of the SU(3) and SU(2) groups. Further, we introduce a GPU-based implementation of the latter and investigate its performance compared with a CPU-based version of the same. We find that the CUDA implementation delivers speedups of 2.27x - 5.93x

JupiterNCSM: A Pantheon of Nuclear Physics —an implementation of three-nucleon forces in the no-core shell model—

It is well established that three-nucleon forces (3NFs) are necessary for achieving realistic and accurate descriptions of atomic nuclei. In particular, such forces arisenaturally when using chiral effective field theories (χEFT). However, due to the huge computational complexity associated with the inclusion of 3NFs in many-body methods they are often approximated or neglected completely. In this thesis, three different methods to include the physics of 3NFs in the ab initio no-core shell-model(NCSM) have been implemented and tested. In the first method, we approximate the 3NFs as effective two-body operators by exploiting Wick’s theorem to normal order the 3NF relative a harmonic-oscillator Slater determinant reference state and discarding the remaining three-body term. We explored the performance of this single-reference normal-ordered two-body approximation on the ground-state energies of the two smallest closed-core nuclei, 4He and 16O, in particular focusing on consequences of the breaking of translational symmetry. The second approach is a full implementation of 3NFs in a new NCSM code, named JupiterNCSM, that we provide as an open-source research software. We have validated and benchmarked JupiterNCSM against other codes and we have specifically used it to investigate theeffects of different 3NFs on light p-shell nuclei 6He and 6Li. Finally, we implement the eigenvector continuation (EVC) method to emulate the response of ground-state energies of the aforementioned A = 6 nuclei to variations in the low-energy constants of χEFT that parametrize the 3NFs. In this approach, the full Hamiltonian is projected onto a small subspace that is constructed from a few selected eigenvectors. These training vectors are computed with JupiterNCSM in a large model space for a small set of parameter values. This thesis provides the first EVC-based emulation of nuclei computed with a Slater-determinant basis. After the training phase, we find that EVC predictions offer a very high accuracy and more than seven ordersof magnitude computational speedup. As a result we are able to perform rigorous statistical inferences to explore the effects of 3NFs in nuclear many-body systems