Effect of temperature on the volume and surface contributions in the symmetry energy of rare earth nuclei

Abstract

The effect of temperature on the volume and surface contributions in the nuclear symmetry energy and their ratio in the isotopic chains of rare earth Nd, Sm, Gd, and Dy nuclei with N = 82-126 is analyzed in the framework of coherent density fluctuation model (CDFM). The weight function of nuclei, within CDFM, are calculated by using the densities from the temperature-dependent relativistic mean-field (RMF) model. Firstly, we discuss the temperature-dependence of bulk properties of nuclei, within RMF model, such as binding energy, deformation parameter, charge radius and isotopic shift along with comparison with the available experimental data at temperature T=0 MeV. Further, we discuss the thermal evolution of symmetry energy and its volume and surface components. At T=0 MeV, the persistence of a peak in the symmetry energy and components at neutron number N=100 shows the manifestation of deformed shell closure in consonance with an earlier study by one of us [L. Satpathy, S.K. Patra, J. Phys. G 30 (2004) 771; S.K. Ghorui, et al., Phys. Rev. C 85 (2012) 064327]. However, the scenario changes with rise in temperature and the magnitude of peak decreases at higher temperatures. At T=3 MeV, the peak disappears which may be due to shape change in addition to quenching of shell effects since the quadrupole deformation parameter β2 decreases with an increase in temperature and nuclei become spherical at T=3 MeV. It indicates that behavior of symmetry energy is closely related to the deformation/shape of the nuclei. We have also discussed the values of volume symmetry energy, surface symmetry energy and their ratio which are in consonance with available experimental data.