A soluble model for the study of saturation in finite nuclei

Abstract

The deviation of very small nuclear systems from saturation is studied. In the framework of a soluble one-dimensional model based on the energy density formalism, we establish simple expressions for the density profile, the deviation from nuclear matter density, and the Fermi energy as a function of particle number. The binding energy of the nucleus is computed and the effect of the departure from saturation is identified as a term exponentially decaying for large A. A comparison with the theory of Krappe and Nix is also presented.