State-of-the-art of beyond mean field theories with nuclear density functionals

Abstract

We present an overview of different beyond mean field theories (BMFTs) based on the generator coordinate method (GCM) and the recovery of symmetries used in many body nuclear physics with effective forces. In a first step a short reminder of the Hartree–Fock–Bogoliubov (HFB) theory is given. A general discussion of the shortcomings of any mean field approximation (MFA), stemming either from the lack of the elementary symmetries (like particle number and angular momentum) or the absence of fluctuations around the mean values, is presented. The recovery of the symmetries spontaneously broken in the HFB approach, in particular the angular momentum, is necessary, among others, to describe excited states and transitions. Particle number projection is also needed to guarantee the right number of protons and neutrons. Furthermore a projection before the variation prevents the pairing collapse in the weak pairing regime. A whole chapter is devoted to illustrate with examples the convenience of recovering symmetries and the differences between the projection before and after the variation. The lack of fluctuations around the average values of the MFA is a big shortcoming inherent to this approach. To build in correlations in BMFT one selects the relevant degrees of freedom of the atomic nucleus. In the low energy part of the spectrum these are the quadrupole, octupole and the pairing vibrations as well as the single particle degrees of freedom. In the GCM the operators representing these degrees of freedom are used as coordinates to generate, by the constrained (projected) HFB theory, a collective subspace. The highly correlated GCM wave function is finally written as a linear combination of a projected basis of this space. The variation of the coefficients of the linear combination leads to the Hill–Wheeler equation. The flexibility of the GCM Ansatz allows to describe a whole palette of physical situations by conveniently choosing the generator coordinates. We discuss the classical β and γ vibrations by considering the quadrupole operators as coordinates. We present pairing fluctuations by considering the pairing gaps as generator coordinates. The combination of quadrupole and pairing fluctuations mirrors the elementary modes of excitation of the atomic nucleus and provides a realistic description of it. Lastly the explicit consideration of the time reversal symmetry breaking in the HFB wave function by the cranking procedure allows the alignment of nucleon pairs opening a new dimension in the BMFT calculations. Abundant calculations with the finite range density dependent Gogny force applied to exotic nuclei illustrate the state-of-the-art of BMFTs with nuclear density functionals. We conclude with a thorough discussion on the potential poles of the theory.