The Science
The Impact
Despite progress in nuclear theory, scientists still face long-standing challenges in their understanding of nuclei. For instance, researchers have not connected the description of nuclear size with the underlying theory of the strong nuclear force. Moreover, it is not clear whether nuclear theories that describe finite atomic nuclei can provide a reliable description of nuclear matter. This special form of matter consists of interacting protons and neutrons. Nuclear matter includes matter in extreme conditions such as neutron stars. Precision measurements of charge radii—the radius of atomic nuclei—help solve these open questions.
Summary
Researchers used laser spectroscopy measurements of atomic isotope shifts to measure the nuclear radius of different silicon isotopes at the BEam COoler and LAser spectroscopy facility (BECOLA) at the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) at Michigan State University. They performed the measurements for the stable silicon isotopes silicon-28, silicon-29, and silicon-30, as well as for the unstable silicon-32, which has 14 protons and 18 neutrons.
The results provide an important benchmark for the development of nuclear theory. The charge radii difference between the silicon-32 nucleus and its mirror nucleus argon-32, which has 18 protons and 14 neutrons, was used to constrain parameters needed to describe the properties of dense neutron matter within neutron stars. The obtained results agree with the constraints from gravitational wave observations and other complementary observables.
Funding
This work was supported in part by the Department of Energy Office of Science, Office of Nuclear Physics’ SciDAC-5 NUCLEI Collaboration and by the National Science Foundation.
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