η bound states in nuclei

Abstract

The energies and widths of bound states of the η meson in different nuclei are obtained using the results for its selfenergy in a nuclear medium, which is evaluated in a selfconsistent manner using techniques of unitarized chiral perturbation theory. We find bound states in all studied nuclei (from 12C on) and the half widths obtained are larger than the separation of the levels, what makes the experimental observation of peaks unlikely. We have paid a special attention to the region of nuclei where only the 1s state appears and the binding energies are of the order of magnitude of the half width, which would magnify the chances that some broad peak could be observed. This is found in the region of 24Mg with a binding energy around 12.6 MeV and half width of 16.7 MeV. In heavy nuclei like 208Pb there are many bound states which would be difficult to disentangle and the deepest state has a binding energy about 21 MeV and half width around 16 MeV. Such an overlapping accumulation of states could be seen as an extension of the continuum of η strength into the bound region in η production experiments.