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arXiv:1901.00870 · Physical Review Letters

Nonperturbative Extraction of the Effective Mass in Neutron Matter

Mateusz Buraczynski, Nawar Ismail, Alexandros Gezerlis

Published Apr 19, 2019• 24 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We carry out nonperturbative calculations of the single-particle excitation spectrum in strongly interacting neutron matter. These are microscopic quantum Monte Carlo computations of many-neutron energies at different densities as well as several distinct excited states. As input, we employ both phenomenological and chiral two- and three-nucleon interactions. We use the single-particle spectrum to extract the effective mass in neutron matter. With a view to systematizing the error involved in this extraction, we carefully assess the impact of finite-size effects on the quasiparticle dispersion relation. We find an effective-mass ratio that drops from 1 as the density is increased. We conclude by connecting our results with the physics of ultracold gases as well as with energy-density functional theories of nuclei and neutron-star matter.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.122.152701

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We carry out nonperturbative calculations of the single-particle excitation spectrum in strongly interacting neutron matter. These are microscopic quantum Monte Carlo computations of many-neutron energies at different densities as well as several distinct excited states. As input, we employ both phenomenological and chiral two- and three-nucleon interactions. We use the single-particle spectrum to extract the effective mass in neutron matter. With a view to systematizing the error involved in this extraction, we carefully assess the impact of finite-size effects on the quasiparticle dispersion relation. We find an effective-mass ratio that drops from 1 as the density is increased. We conclude by connecting our results with the physics of ultracold gases as well as with energy-density functional theories of nuclei and neutron-star matter.
We report results of fully nonperturbative, path integral Monte Carlo calculations for dilute neutron matter. The neutron-neutron interaction in the sss channel is parameterized by the scattering length and the effective range. We calculate the energy and the chemical potential as a function of temperature at density $\ensuremath{\rho}=0.003 {\text{fm}}^{\ensuremath{-}3}$. The critical temperature Tc{T}_{c}Tc​ for the superfluid-normal phase transition is estimated from the finite size scaling of the condensate fraction. At low temperatures we extract the spectral weight function $A(\mathbf{p},\ensuremath{\omega})$ from the imaginary time propagator using the methods of maximum entropy and singular value decomposition. We determine the quasiparticle spectrum, which can be accurately parameterized by three parameters: an effective mass m∗{m}^{*}m∗, a mean-field potential UUU, and a gap $\ensuremath{\Delta}$. Large values of $\ensuremath{\Delta}/{T}_{c}$ indicate that the system is not a BCS-type superfluid at low temperatures.
Neutron matter, through its connection to neutron stars as well as systems such as cold atom gases, is one of the most interesting yet computationally accessible systems in nuclear physics. The configuration-interaction Monte Carlo (CIMC) method is a stochastic many-body technique allowing us to tackle strongly coupled systems. In contrast to other quantum Monte Carlo methods employed in nuclear physics, the CIMC method can be formulated directly in momentum space allowing for an efficient use of nonlocal interactions. In this work we extend CIMC method to include three-nucleon interactions through the normal-ordered two-body approximation. We present results for the equation of state of neutron matter in line with other many-body calculations that employ low-resolution chiral interactions, and provide predictions for the momentum distribution and the static structure factor.
Uniform neutron matter is approximated by a cubical box containing a finite number of neutrons, with periodic boundary conditions. We report variational and Green's function Monte Carlo calculations of the ground state of fourteen neutrons in a periodic box using the Argonne ${v8}^{\ensuremath{'}}$ two-nucleon interaction at densities up to one and half times the nuclear matter density. The effects of the finite box size are estimated using variational wave functions together with cluster expansion and chain summation techniques. They are small at subnuclear densities. We discuss the expansion of the energy of low-density neutron gas in powers of its Fermi momentum. This expansion is strongly modified by the large nn\mathrm{nn}nn scattering length, and does not begin with the Fermi-gas kinetic energy, as assumed in both Skyrme and relativistic mean field theories. The leading term of neutron gas energy is approximately half the Fermi-gas kinetic energy. The quantum Monte Carlo results are also used to calibrate the accuracy of variational calculations employing Fermi hypernetted and single operator chain summation methods to study nucleon matter over a larger density range, with more realistic Hamiltonians including three-nucleon interactions.
This thesis contains two topics related to strongly interacting neutron matter. The first considers the effective mass, described in Landau Fermi liquid theory, which aims to capture many-body physics in terms of a single parameter. Monte Carlo algorithms were used to determine energies for finite particle simulations. Studying the deviations from the thermodynamic limit for the non-interacting gas allows for claims about the macroscopic scale. Following this systematic investigation, the density dependence was determined to be less than one for the considered densities. The second topic focuses on machine learning algorithms which have proliferated into many fields, with an emerging popularity in nuclear physics. These algorithms work by learning patterns found in datasets to develop their predictive power. After identifying and resolving issues introduced by a small dataset, they were used to extrapolate finite calculations to zero effective-range in the thermodynamic limit, which best approximates neutron matter.
Ab initio calculations provide direct access to the properties of pure neutron systems that are challenging to study experimentally. In addition to their importance for fundamental physics, their properties are required as input for effective field theories of the strong interaction. In this work, we perform auxiliary-field diffusion Monte Carlo calculations of the ground state and first excited state of two neutrons in a finite box, considering a simple contact potential as well as chiral effective field theory interactions. We compare the results against exact diagonalizations and present a detailed analysis of the finite-volume effects, whose understanding is crucial for determining observables from the calculated energies. Using the L\"uscher formula, we extract the low-energy SSS-wave scattering parameters from ground- and excited-state energies for different box sizes.
Abstract Pure neutron matter is not likely to be found in any of the Earth’s laboratories, but it has been found to exist as the material of neutron stars. It presents an interesting and difficult manybody problem which may be attacked by QMC methods. In this paper the authors report variational, approximate fixed-node, and released-node QMC calculations for uniform neutron matter in a three-dimensional box with periodic boundary conditions. These allow the determination of the energy E(p) as a function of the neutron density p for a realistic two-neutron interaction expression. The results are used to assess the accuracy of earlier variational approaches. The system treated was that of 14 neutrons in a cube at densities in the range of 1 / 4 to 3/2 the density p0 typical for nuclear matter. Most of the calculations were done for the Argonne v8’ two-body interaction potential. The trial wavefunction was a correlated Slater function, identical for the variational and diffusion calculations, specifying the nodes and used in importance sampling. Corrections were made for the effects of finite box dimensions. The released-node calculations were limited to very short time intervals especially for the higher densities. The energies E(p) found in the diffusion QMC calculations were 5 to 10% lower than those of the variational QMC. The releasednode results, with relatively large statistical errors, were not significantly different from the fixed-node results. The energies determined for the lower densities were estimated to be accurate within 2% and those for the higher densities somewhat less accurate. The results showed earlier predictions to be generally correct. Comparisons of results from variational chain summations (VCS) indicated an overall accuracy of about 10% for that method.