arXiv subjects

Hongfu Li

Publications and source records attributed to Hongfu Li.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Precision masses of neutron-rich platinum and gold nuclei reveal enhanced $N=126$ shell strength below doubly-magic $^{208}$Pb

The heaviest stable nuclei in the universe owe their existence to quantum shell structure, the grouping of protons and neutrons into discrete energy levels separated by gaps. The largest known neutron shell gap in stable nuclei, at $N=126$, stabilizes doubly-magic $^{208}$Pb and is responsible for the characteristic abundance peak of heavy elements near gold and platinum produced by the rapid neutron-capture process (r-process). Whether this shell gap persists as protons are removed from lead is a question central to both nuclear structure and the modeling of heavy-element synthesis, yet it has remained unanswered due to the extraordinary difficulty of producing the relevant neutron-rich nuclei. Direct experimental knowledge in this region was essentially absent. Here we report the first precision mass measurements of $^{203,204}$Pt and $^{204,205,206}$Au, performed at GSI using a novel combination of Schottky and isochronous mass spectrometry in a heavy-ion storage ring. The $N=126$ isotones $^{204}$Pt and $^{205}$Au are more strongly bound than the extrapolated trend of the previously known mass surface by 403 and 464~keV, respectively, revealing an unexpectedly enhanced $N=126$ shell strength below doubly-magic $^{208}$Pb. Furthermore, the proton-neutron interaction strength exhibits a hitherto unobserved bifurcation at $N=126$ as protons are removed from $^{208}$Pb. Our results redefine the nuclear mass surface in the neutron-rich heavy-element region and provide direct experimental benchmarks for theoretical models whose extrapolations toward more exotic nuclei are essential for r-process nucleosynthesis calculations.

nucl-ex↗

arXiv2025

A novel method of half-life determination for highly charged ions based on isochronous mass spectrometry

The lifetime of the isomeric state in fully stripped 94Ru44+ ions has been measured using isochronous mass spectrometry (IMS) at the experimental Cooler Storage Ring (CSRe) of the Heavy Ion Research Facility in Lanzhou (HIRFL). Previously, the isomeric lifetime was determined by analyzing the decay time points of individual decay events. In this paper, we present a novel approach to determine the isomeric lifetime based on the survival time of ions obtained from IMS. The survival lifetimes of the ground and isomeric states of 94Ru44+ were measured to be s and s in the laboratory, respectively. Given that the ground state of 94Ru44+ has a natural lifetime of approximately 75 min, its survival lifetime in the experimental setup was predominantly determined by the beam-loss lifetime, including interactions with residual gas in the storage ring and carbon foil of the detector. In contrast, the survival lifetime of 94mRu44+ was governed by its intrinsic nuclear lifetime and additional beam-loss effects. The nuclear decay lifetime of 94mRu44+ was extracted through differential survival lifetime analysis between ground and isomeric states, under the assumption that the beam-loss lifetimes for both quantum systems are identical. Using this novel methodology, the lifetime measured in the laboratory frame was s. After relativistic time-dilation corrections, the corresponding rest-frame half-life was calculated to be s. This result demonstrates excellent consistency with previous experimental results, validating the reliability of the new method. This method is suitable for determining half-lives of highly charged ions in the range of several tens of microseconds to milliseconds using IMS.

physics.ins-det↗

arXiv2024

LSMGraph: A High-Performance Dynamic Graph Storage System with Multi-Level CSR

The growing volume of graph data may exhaust the main memory. It is crucial to design a disk-based graph storage system to ingest updates and analyze graphs efficiently. However, existing dynamic graph storage systems suffer from read or write amplification and face the challenge of optimizing both read and write performance simultaneously. To address this challenge, we propose LSMGraph, a novel dynamic graph storage system that combines the write-friendly LSM-tree and the read-friendly CSR. It leverages the multi-level structure of LSM-trees to optimize write performance while utilizing the compact CSR structures embedded in the LSM-trees to boost read performance. LSMGraph uses a new memory structure, MemGraph, to efficiently cache graph updates and uses a multi-level index to speed up reads within the multi-level structure. Furthermore, LSMGraph incorporates a vertex-grained version control mechanism to mitigate the impact of LSM-tree compaction on read performance and ensure the correctness of concurrent read and write operations. Our evaluation shows that LSMGraph significantly outperforms state-of-the-art (graph) storage systems on both graph update and graph analytical workloads.

cs.DB↗

arXiv2023

GastCoCo: Graph Storage and Coroutine-Based Prefetch Co-Design for Dynamic Graph Processing

An efficient data structure is fundamental to meeting the growing demands in dynamic graph processing. However, the dual requirements for graph computation efficiency (with contiguous structures) and graph update efficiency (with linked list-like structures) present a conflict in the design principles of graph structures. After experimental studies of existing state-of-the-art dynamic graph structures, we observe that the overhead of cache misses accounts for a major portion of the graph computation time. This paper presents GastCoCo, a system with graph storage and coroutine-based prefetch co-design. By employing software prefetching via stackless coroutines and introducing a prefetch-friendly data structure CBList, GastCoCo significantly alleviates the performance degradation caused by cache misses. Our results show that GastCoCo outperforms state-of-the-art graph storage systems by 1.3x - 180x in graph updates and 1.4x - 41.1x in graph computation.

cs.DB↗