arXiv · 2512.15879
Two-proton emission as source of spin-entangled proton pairs
Abstract
We show that a two-proton emitter with a diproton-correlated initial state can act as a source of spin-correlated proton pairs. Using a time-dependent three-body model, we investigate the two-proton emission of $^{16}$Ne ($^{14}$O$+2p$) and analyze the spin correlation of the emitted protons. We find that, when the emission proceeds as a democratic three-body process from an initial state containing a spin-singlet diproton correlation, the emitted protons exhibit a pronounced spin-correlation pattern exceeding the local-hidden-variable bound. This spin correlation closely resembles that of a pure spin-singlet pair. In contrast, this pattern is lost when the process is dominated by the sequential emission or when the initial diproton correlation is absent. These results demonstrate that a certain class of two-proton emitters can deliver spin-entangled proton pairs, and their spin correlation reflects the diproton correlation embedded in the initial state.
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Tomohiro Oishi, Masaaki Kimura. 2025-12-17. Two-proton emission as source of spin-entangled proton pairs. https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.15879
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