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D. Lacroix

Publications and source records attributed to D. Lacroix.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
arXiv2016

Combining symmetry breaking and restoration with configuration interaction: a highly accurate many-body scheme applied to the pairing Hamiltonian

Background: Ab initio many-body methods have been developed over the past ten years to address mid-mass nuclei... As progress in the design of inter-nucleon interactions is made, further efforts must be made to tailor many-body methods. Methods: We formulate a truncated configuration interaction method that consists of diagonalizing the Hamiltonian in a highly truncated subspace of the total N-body Hilbert space. The reduced Hilbert space is generated via the particle-number projected BCS state along with projected seniority-zero two and four quasi-particle excitations. Furthermore, the extent by which the underlying BCS state breaks U(1) symmetry is optimized in presence of the projected two and four quasi-particle excitations... The quality of the newly designed method is tested against exact solutions of the so-called attractive pairing Hamiltonian problem. Results: By construction, the method reproduce exact results for N=2 and N=4. For N=(8,16,20) the error on the ground-state correlation energy is less than (0.006, 0.1, 0.15) % across the entire range of inter-nucleon coupling defining the pairing Hamiltonian and driving the normal-to-superfluid quantum phase transition. The presently proposed method offers the advantage to automatically access the low-lying spectroscopy, which it does with high accuracy. Conclusions: The numerical cost of the newly designed variational method is polynomial (N$^6$) in system size. It achieves an unprecedented accuracy on the ground-state correlation energy, effective pairing gap and one-body entropy as well as on the excitation energy of low-lying states of the attractive pairing Hamiltonian. This constitutes a strong enough motivation to envision its application to realistic nuclear Hamiltonians in view of providing a complementary, accurate and versatile ab initio description of mid-mass open-shell nuclei in the future.

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arXiv2016

From dilute matter to the equilibrium point in the energy--density--functional theory

Due to the large value of the scattering length in nuclear systems, standard density--functional theories based on effective interactions usually fail to reproduce the nuclear Fermi liquid behavior both at very low densities and close to equilibrium. Guided on one side by the success of the Skyrme density functional and, on the other side, by resummation techniques used in Effective Field Theories for systems with large scattering lengths, a new energy--density functional is proposed. This functional, adjusted on microscopic calculations, reproduces the nuclear equations of state of neutron and symmetric matter at various densities. Furthermore, it provides reasonable saturation properties as well as an appropriate density dependence for the symmetry energy.

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arXiv2016

Superfluid fission dynamics with microscopic approaches

Recent progresses in the description of the latter stage of nuclear fission are reported. Dynamical effects during the descent of the potential towards scission and in the formation of the fission fragments are studied with the time-dependent Hartree-Fock approach with dynamical pairing correlations at the BCS level. In particular, this approach is used to compute the final kinetic energy of the fission fragments. Comparison with experimental data on the fission of 258Fm are made.

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arXiv2015

Quantal description of nucleon exchange in stochastic mean-field approach

Nucleon exchange mechanism is investigated in central collisions of symmetric heavy-ions in the basis of the stochastic mean-field approach. Quantal diffusion coefficients for nucleon exchange are calculated by including non-Markovian effects and shell structure. Variances of fragment mass distributions are calculated in central collisions of ${}^{40}$Ca + ${}^{40}$Ca, ${}^{48}$Ca + ${}^{48}$Ca and ${}^{56}$Ni + ${}^{56}$Ni systems.

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arXiv2014

Deformation effects on the coexistence between neutron-proton and particle like pairing in N=Z medium mass nuclei

A model combining self-consistent mean-field and shell-model techniques is used to study the competition between particle like and proton-neutron pairing correlations in fp-shell even-even self-conjugate nuclei. Results obtained using constant two-body pairing interactions as well as more sophisticated interactions are presented and discussed. The standard BCS calculations are systematically compared with more refined approaches including correlation effects beyond the independent quasi-particle approach. The competition between proton-neutron correlations in the isoscalar and isovector channels is also analyzed, as well as their dependence on the deformation properties. Besides the expected role of the spin-orbit interaction and particle number conservation, it is shown that deformation leads to a reduction of the pairing correlations. This reduction originates from the change of the single-particle spectrum and from a quenching of the residual pairing matrix elements. The competition between isoscalar and isovector pairing in the deuteron transfer is finally addressed. Although a strong dependence the isovector pairing correlations with respect to nuclear deformation is observed, they always dominate over the isoscalar ones.

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arXiv2014

Nucleon exchange in heavy-ion collisions within stochastic mean-field approach

Nucleon exchange mechanism is investigated in deep-inelastic symmetric heavy-ion collisions in the basis of the Stochastic Mean-Field approach. By extending the previous work to off-central collisions, analytical expression is deduced for diffusion coefficient of nucleon exchange mechanism. Numerical calculations are carried out for ${}^{40}$Ca + ${}^{40}$Ca and ${}^{90}$Zr + ${}^{90}$Zr systems and the results are compared with the phenomenological nucleon exchange model. Also, calculations are compared with the available experimental results of deep-inelastic collisions between calcium nuclei.

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arXiv2014

Non-Markovian dynamics with fermions

Employing the quadratic fermionic Hamiltonians for the collective and internal subsystems with a linear coupling, we studied the role of fermionic statistics on the dynamics of the collective motion. The transport coefficients are discussed as well as the associated fluctuation-dissipation relation. Due to different nature of the particles, the path to equilibrium is slightly affected. However, in the weak coupling regime, the time-scale for approaching equilibrium is found to be globally unchanged. The Pauli-blocking effect can modify the usual picture in open quantum system. In some limits, contrary to boson, this effect can strongly hinder the influence of the bath by blocking the interacting channels.

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arXiv2013

Neutron pair transfer in sub-barrier capture process

The sub-barrier capture reactions following the neutron pair transfer are proposed to be used for the indirect study of neutron-neutron correlation in the surface region of nucleus. The strong effect of the dineutron-like clusters transfer stemming from the surface of magic and non-magic nuclei $^{18}$O, $^{48}$Ca, $^{64}$Ni, $^{94,96}$Mo, $^{100,102,104}$Ru, $^{104,106,108}$Pd, and $^{112,114,116,118,120,124,132}$Sn is demonstrated. The dominance of two-neutron transfer channel at the vicinity of the Coulomb barrier is further supported by time-dependent mean-field approaches.

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arXiv2013

Polarization of the nuclear surface in deformed nuclei

The density profiles of around 750 nuclei are analyzed using the Skyrme energy density functional theory. Among them, more than 350 nuclei are found to be deformed. In addition to rather standard properties of the density, we report a non-trivial behavior of the nuclear diffuseness as the system becomes more and more deformed. Besides the geometric effects expected in rigid body, the diffuseness acquires a rather complex behavior leading to a reduction of the diffuseness along the main axis of deformation simultaneously with an increase of the diffuseness along the other axis. The possible isospin dependence of this polarization is studied. This effect, that is systematically seen in medium- and heavy-nuclei, can affect the nuclear dynamical properties. A quantitative example is given with the fusion barrier in the $^{40}$Ca+ $^{238}$U reaction.

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arXiv2012

Pair-transfer probability in open- and closed-shell Sn isotopes

Approximations made to estimate two-nucleon transfer probabilities in ground-state to ground-state transitions and physical interpretation of these probabilities are discussed. Probabilities are often calculated by approximating both ground states, of the initial nucleus A and of the final nucleus A\pm 2 by the same quasiparticle vacuum. We analyze two improvements of this approach. First, the effect of using two different ground states with average numbers of particles A and A\pm2 is quantified. Second, by using projection techniques, the role of particle number restoration is analyzed. Our analysis shows that the improved treatment plays a role close to magicity, leading to an enhancement of the pair-transfer probability. In mid-shell regions, part of the error made by approximating the initial and final ground states by a single vacuum is compensated by projecting onto good particle number. Surface effects are analyzed by using pairing interactions with a different volume-to-surface mixing. Finally, a simple expression of the pair-transfer probability is given in terms of occupation probabilities in the canonical basis. We show that, in the canonical basis formulation, surface effects which are visible in the transfer probability are related to the fragmentation of single-particle occupancies close to the Fermi energy. This provides a complementary interpretation with respect to the standard quasiparticle representation where surface effects are generated by the integrated radial profiles of the contributing wave functions.

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arXiv2012

Pairing dynamics in particle transport

We analyze the effect of pairing on particle transport in time-dependent theories based on the Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov (HFB) or BCS approximations. The equations of motion for the HFB density matrices are unique and the theory respects the usual conservation laws defined by commutators of the conserved quantity with the Hamiltonian. In contrast, the theories based on the BCS approximation are more problematic. In the usual formulation of TDHF+BCS, the equation of continuity is violated and one sees unphysical oscillations in particle densities. This can be ameliorated by freezing the occupation numbers during the evolution in TDHF+BCS, but there are other problems with the BCS that make it doubtful for reaction dynamics. We also compare different numerical implementations of the time-dependent HFB equations. The equations of motion for the $U$ and $V$ Bogoliubov transformations are not unique, but it appears that the usual formulation is also the most efficient. Finally, we compare the time-dependent HFB solutions with numerically exact solutions of the two-particle Schrodinger equation. Depending on the treatment of the initial state, the HFB dynamics produces a particle emission rate at short times similar to that of the Schrodinger equation. At long times, the total particle emission can be quite different, due to inherent mean-field approximation of the HFB theory.

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arXiv2011

On nucleon exchange mechanism in heavy-ion collisions at near-barrier energies

Nucleon drift and diffusion mechanisms in central collisions of asymmetric heavy-ions at near-barrier energies are investigated in the framework of a stochastic mean-field approach. Expressions for diffusion and drift coefficients for nucleon transfer deduced from the stochastic mean-field approach in the semiclassical approximation have similar forms familiar from the phenomenological nucleon exchange model. The variance of fragment mass distribution agrees with the empirical formula $σ^2_{AA}(t)= N_{\rm exc}(t)$. The comparison with the time-dependent Hartree-Fock calculations shows that, below barrier energies, the drift coefficient in the semiclassical approximation underestimates the mean number of nucleon transfer obtained in the quantal framework. Motion of the window in the dinuclear system has a significant effect on the nucleon transfer in asymmetric collisions.

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arXiv2010

Regularization of Multi-Reference Energy Density Functional Calculations

We report the first application of a recently proposed regularization procedure for multi-reference energy density functionals, which removes spurious divergent or non-continuous contributions to the binding energy, to a general configuration mixing. As an example, we present a calculation that corresponds to the particle-number and angular momentum projection of axially symmetric time-reversal invariant quasiparticle vacua of different quadrupole deformation for the nucleus O18. The SIII parameterization of the Skyrme energy functional is used.

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arXiv2010

Probing pre-formed alpha particles in the ground state of nuclei

In this Letter, we report on alpha particle emission through the nuclear break-up in the reaction 40Ca on a 40Ca target at 50A MeV. It is observed that, similarly to nucleons, alpha particles can be emitted to the continuum with very specific angular distribution during the reaction. The alpha particle properties can be understood as resulting from an alpha cluster in the daughter nucleus that is perturbed by the short range nuclear attraction of the collision partner and emitted. A time-dependent theory that describe the alpha particle wave-function evolution is able to reproduce qualitatively the observed angular distribution. This mechanism offers new possibilities to study alpha particle properties in the nuclear medium.

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arXiv2010

Quantum Monte-Carlo method applied to Non-Markovian barrier transmission

In nuclear fusion and fission, fluctuation and dissipation arise due to the coupling of collective degrees of freedom with internal excitations. Close to the barrier, both quantum, statistical and non-Markovian effects are expected to be important. In this work, a new approach based on quantum Monte-Carlo addressing this problem is presented. The exact dynamics of a system coupled to an environment is replaced by a set of stochastic evolutions of the system density. The quantum Monte-Carlo method is applied to systems with quadratic potentials. In all range of temperature and coupling, the stochastic method matches the exact evolution showing that non-Markovian effects can be simulated accurately. A comparison with other theories like Nakajima-Zwanzig or Time-ConvolutionLess ones shows that only the latter can be competitive if the expansion in terms of coupling constant is made at least to fourth order. A systematic study of the inverted parabola case is made at different temperatures and coupling constants. The asymptotic passing probability is estimated in different approaches including the Markovian limit. Large differences with the exact result are seen in the latter case or when only second order in the coupling strength is considered as it is generally assumed in nuclear transport models. On opposite, if fourth order in the coupling or quantum Monte-Carlo method is used, a perfect agreement is obtained.

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arXiv2009

Beyond mean-field description of break-up, transfer and fusion

Microscopic theories beyond mean-field are developed to include pairing, in-medium nucleon-nucleon collisions as well as effects of initial fluctuations of one-body observables on nuclear dynamics. These theories are applied to nuclear reactions. The role of pairing on nuclear break-up is discussed. By including the effect of zero point motion of collective variables through a stochastic mean-field theory, not only average evolution of one-body observables are properly described but also fluctuations. Diffusion coefficients in fusion as well as mass distributions in transfer reactions are estimated.

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arXiv2009

Configuration Mixing within the Energy Density Functional Formalism: Removing Spurious Contributions from Non-Diagonal Energy Kernels

Multi-reference calculations along the lines of the Generator Coordinate Method or the restoration of broken symmetries within the nuclear Energy Density Functional (EDF) framework are becoming a standard tool in nuclear structure physics. These calculations rely on the extension of a single-reference energy functional, of the Gogny or the Skyrme types, to non-diagonal energy kernels. There is no rigorous constructive framework for this extension so far. The commonly accepted way proceeds by formal analogy with the expressions obtained when applying the generalized Wick theorem to the non-diagonal matrix element of a Hamilton operator between two product states. It is pointed out that this procedure is ill-defined when extended to EDF calculations as the generalized Wick theorem is taken outside of its range of applicability. In particular, such a procedure is responsible for the appearance of spurious divergences and steps in multi-reference EDF energies, as was recently observed in calculations restoring particle number or angular momentum. In the present work, we give a formal analysis of the origin of this problem for calculations with and without pairing, i.e. constructing the density matrices from either Slater determinants or quasi-particle vacua. We propose a correction to energy kernels that removes the divergences and steps, and which is applicable to calculations based on any symmetry restoration or generator coordinate. The method is formally illustrated for particle number restoration and is specified to configuration mixing calculations based on Slater determinants.

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