How do mirror charge radii constrain density dependence of the symmetry energy?

Abstract

It has recently been suggested that differences in the charge radii of mirror nuclei ($\Delta R^{\rm mirr}_{\rm ch}$) are strongly correlated with the neutron-skin thickness ($R_{\rm skin}$) of neutron-rich nuclei and with the slope of the symmetry energy ($L$). To test this assumption, we present ab initio calculations of $R_{\rm skin}$ in $^{48}$Ca and $^{208}$Pb, $\Delta R^{\rm mirr}_{\rm ch}$ in $^{36}$Ca$-^{36}$S, $^{38}$Ca$-^{38}$Ar, $^{41}$Sc$-^{41}$Ca, $^{48}$Ni$-^{48}$Ca, $^{52}$Ni$-^{52}$Cr, and $^{54}$Ni$-^{54}$Fe mirror pairs, and $L$. Employing the recently developed 34 chiral interaction samples, identified by the history matching approach, we conduct rigorous statistical analysis of correlations among $\Delta R^{\rm mirr}_{\rm ch}$, $R_{\rm skin}$ and $L$, accounting for quantified uncertainties from low-energy constants of chiral interaction, chiral effective field theory truncation and many-body method approximation. The ab initio results reveal an appreciable $\Delta R^{\rm mirr}_{\rm ch}-L$ correlation in $fp$-shell mirror pairs. However, contrary to previous studies, the present calculation finds that the studied $sd$-shell mirror pairs do not exhibit any $\Delta R^{\rm mirr}_{\rm ch}-L$ correlation.