Effective Field Theory Approach to Two- and Many-Body Forces

R. J. Furnstahl

Vladimir Zelevinsky

Conventional many-body quantum theory considers, as a rule, a system of particles in the mean field interacting through two-body forces. Recently it was suggested that in nuclear physics many-body forces, first of all three-body ones, are important for saturation of nuclear matter and for many details of nuclear structure. We consider possible influence of three-body forces, regardless of their origin (bare nucleon interactions or effective medium phenomena), on many-body dynamics. The new effects include, but are not limited to, renormalization of pairing and other two-body forces, enhancement of anharmonicity for collective modes, and special features of shell model calculations.

Thomas Schäfer, Chung Wen Kao, Stephen R. Cotanch

H.‐W. Hammer

Effective Field Theory (EFT) provides a powerful framework that exploits a separation of scales in physical systems to perform systematically improvable, model-independent calculations. Particularly interesting are few-body systems with short-range interactions and large two-body scattering length. Such systems display remarkable universal features. In systems with more than two particles, a three-body force with limit cycle behavior is required for consistent renormalization already at leading order. We will review this EFT and some of its applications in the physics of cold atoms and nuclear physics. In particular, we will discuss the possibility of an infrared limit cycle in QCD. Recent extensions of the EFT approach to the four-body system and N-boson droplets in two spatial dimensions will also be addressed.

A. Schwenk, János Polonyi

H.‐W. Hammer

Effective Field Theory (EFT) provides a powerful framework that exploits a separation of scales in physical systems to perform systematically improvable, model‐independent calculations. Particularly interesting are few‐body systems with short‐range interactions and large two‐body scattering length. Such systems display remarkable universal features. In systems with more than two particles, a three‐body force with limit cycle behavior is required for consistent renormalization already at leading order. We will review this EFT and some of its applications in the physics of cold atoms. Recent extensions of this approach to the four‐body system and N‐boson droplets in two spatial dimensions will also be discussed.