Ab Initio Treatment of Collective Correlations and the Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay of ^{48}Ca

Impact of correlations on nuclear binding energies: Ab initio calculations of singly and doubly open-shell nuclei

A strong effort will be dedicated in the coming years to extend the reach of ab initio nuclear-structure calculations to heavy doubly open-shell nuclei. In order to do so, the most efficient strategies to incorporate dominant many-body correlations at play in such nuclei must be identified. With this motivation in mind, the present work analyses the step-by-step inclusion of many-body correlations and their impact on binding energies of Calcium and Chromium isotopes. Employing an empirically-optimal Hamiltonian built from chiral effective field theory, binding energies along both isotopic chains are studied via a hierarchy of approximations based on polynomially-scaling expansion many-body methods. More specifically, calculations are performed based on (i) the spherical Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov mean-field approximation plus correlations from second-order Bogoliubov many-body perturbation theory or Bogoliubov coupled cluster with singles and doubles on top of it, along with (ii) the axially-deformed Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov mean-field approximation plus correlations from second-order Bogoliubov many-body perturbation theory built on it. The corresponding results are compared to experimental data and to those obtained via valence-space in-medium similarity renormalization group calculations at the normal-ordered two-body level that act as a reference in the present study. The spherical mean-field approximation is shown to display specific shortcomings in Ca isotopes that can be understood analytically and that are efficiently corrected via the consistent addition of low-order dynamical correlations on top of it. While the same setting cannot appropriately reproduce binding energies in doubly open-shell Cr isotopes, allowing the unperturbed mean-field state to break rotational symmetry permits to efficiently capture the static correlations responsible for the phenomenological differences observed between the two isotopic chains. Eventually, the present work demonstrates that polynomially-scaling expansion methods based on unperturbed states that possibly break (and restore) symmetries constitute an optimal route to extend ab initio calculations to heavy closed- and open-shell nuclei.

Experimental neutrino physics in a nuclear landscape

There are profound connections between neutrino physics and nuclear experiments. Exceptionally precise measurements of single and double beta-decay spectra illuminate the scale and nature of neutrino mass and may finally answer the question of whether neutrinos are their own anti-matter counterparts. Neutrino-nucleus scattering underpins oscillation experiments and probes nuclear structure, neutrinos offer a rare vantage point into collapsing stars and nuclear fission reactors and techniques pioneered in neutrino nuclear physics experiments are advancing quantum sensing technologies. In this article, we review current and planned efforts at the intersection of neutrino and nuclear experiments. This article is part of the theme issue 'The liminal position of Nuclear Physics: from hadrons to neutron stars'.

Opportunities for fundamental physics research with radioactive molecules

Molecules containing short-lived, radioactive nuclei are uniquely positioned to enable a wide range of scientific discoveries in the areas of fundamental symmetries, astrophysics, nuclear structure, and chemistry. Recent advances in the ability to create, cool, and control complex molecules down to the quantum level, along with recent and upcoming advances in radioactive species production at several facilities around the world, create a compelling opportunity to coordinate and combine these efforts to bring precision measurement and control to molecules containing extreme nuclei. In this manuscript, we review the scientific case for studying radioactive molecules, discuss recent atomic, molecular, nuclear, astrophysical, and chemical advances which provide the foundation for their study, describe the facilities where these species are and will be produced, and provide an outlook for the future of this nascent field.

Ab Initio Uncertainty Quantification of Neutrinoless Double-Beta Decay in ^{76}Ge

The observation of neutrinoless double-beta (0νββ) decay would offer proof of lepton number violation, demonstrating that neutrinos are Majorana particles, while also helping us understand why there is more matter than antimatter in the Universe. If the decay is driven by the exchange of the three known light neutrinos, a discovery would, in addition, link the observed decay rate to the neutrino mass scale through a theoretical quantity known as the nuclear matrix element (NME). Accurate values of the NMEs for all nuclei considered for use in 0νββ experiments are therefore crucial for designing and interpreting those experiments. Here, we report the first comprehensive ab initio uncertainty quantification of the 0νββ-decay NME, in the key nucleus ^{76}Ge. Our method employs nuclear strong and weak interactions derived within chiral effective field theory and recently developed many-body emulators. Our result, with a conservative treatment of uncertainty, is an NME of 2.60_{-1.36}^{+1.28}, which, together with the best-existing half-life sensitivity and phase-space factor, sets an upper limit for effective neutrino mass of 187_{-62}^{+205}  meV. The result is important for designing next-generation germanium detectors aiming to cover the entire inverted hierarchy region of neutrino masses.

Interplay of nuclear physics, effective field theories, phenomenology, and lattice QCD in neutrino physics

Experiments in neutrino physics cover a wide range—from deep inelastic scattering, over long base-line oscillation experiments and low-energy coherent neutrino–nucleus scattering (CEνNS), to searches for neutrinoless double β decay (0νββ)—yet in all cases a key aspect in interpreting the results concerns understanding neutrino–nucleus interactions. If the neutrino energy is sufficiently low, the required matrix elements can be constrained in a systematic way by the interplay of effective field theories, phenomenology, and lattice QCD. In these proceedings, we illustrate this strategy focusing on the CEνNS and 0νββ processes.

Ab Initio Calculation of the Contact Operator Contribution in the Standard Mechanism for Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay

Starting from chiral nuclear interactions, we evaluate the contribution of the leading-order contact transition operator to the nuclear matrix element (NME) of neutrinoless double-beta decay, assuming a light Majorana neutrino-exchange mechanism. The corresponding low-energy constant (LEC) is determined by fitting the transition amplitude of the nn→ppe^{-}e^{-} process to a recently proposed synthetic datum. We examine the dependence of the amplitude on similarity renormalization group scale and chiral expansion order of the nuclear interaction, finding that both dependences can be compensated to a large extent by readjusting the LEC. We evaluate the contribution of both the leading-order contact operator and standard long-range operator to the neutrinoless double-beta decays in the light nuclei ^{6,8}He and the candidate nucleus ^{48}Ca. Our results provide the first clear demonstration that the contact term enhances the NME in calculations with commonly used chiral two- plus three-nucleon interactions. In the case of ^{48}Ca, for example, the NME obtained with the EM(1.8/2.0) interaction is enhanced from 0.61 to 0.87(4), where the uncertainty is propagated from the synthetic datum.

Coupled-Cluster Calculations of Neutrinoless Double-β Decay in ^{48}Ca

We use coupled-cluster theory and nuclear interactions from chiral effective field theory to compute the nuclear matrix element for the neutrinoless double-β decay of ^{48}Ca. Benchmarks with the no-core shell model in several light nuclei inform us about the accuracy of our approach. For ^{48}Ca we find a relatively small matrix element. We also compute the nuclear matrix element for the two-neutrino double-β decay of ^{48}Ca with a quenching factor deduced from two-body currents in recent ab initio calculation of the Ikeda sum rule in ^{48}Ca [Gysbers et al., Nat. Phys. 15, 428 (2019)NPAHAX1745-247310.1038/s41567-019-0450-7].

Toward Complete Leading-Order Predictions for Neutrinoless Double β Decay

The amplitude for the neutrinoless double β (0νββ) decay of the two-neutron system nn→ppe^{-}e^{-} constitutes a key building block for nuclear-structure calculations of heavy nuclei employed in large-scale 0νββ searches. Assuming that the 0νββ process is mediated by a light-Majorana-neutrino exchange, a systematic analysis in chiral effective field theory shows that already at leading order a contact operator is required to ensure renormalizability. In this Letter, we develop a method to estimate the numerical value of its coefficient (in analogy to the Cottingham formula for electromagnetic contributions to hadron masses) and validate the result by reproducing the charge-independence-breaking contribution to the nucleon-nucleon scattering lengths. Our central result, while derived in dimensional regularization, is given in terms of the renormalized amplitude A_{ν}(|p|,|p^{'}|), matching to which will allow one to determine the contact-term contribution in regularization schemes employed in nuclear-structure calculations. Our results thus greatly reduce a crucial uncertainty in the interpretation of searches for 0νββ decay.

New and Practical Formulation for Overlaps of Bogoliubov Vacua

In this Letter, we present a new expression for the overlaps of wave functions in Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov based theories. Starting from the Pfaffian formula by Bertsch et al. [1], an exact and computationally stable formula for overlaps is derived. We illustrate the convenience of this new formulation with a numerical application in the context of the particle-number projection method. This new formula allows for substantially increased precision and versatility in chemical, atomic, and nuclear physics applications, particularly for methods dealing with superfluidity, symmetry restoration, and uses of nonorthogonal many-body basis states.

Path from Lattice QCD to the Short-Distance Contribution to 0νββ Decay with a Light Majorana Neutrino

Neutrinoless double-β (0νββ) decay of certain atomic isotopes, if observed, will have significant implications for physics of neutrinos and models of physics beyond the standard model. In the simplest scenario, if the mass of the light neutrino of the standard model has a Majorana component, it can mediate the decay. Systematic theoretical studies of the decay rate in this scenario, through effective field theories matched to ab initio nuclear many-body calculations, are needed to draw conclusions about the hierarchy of neutrino masses, and to plan the design of future experiments. However, a recently identified short-distance contribution at leading order in the effective field theory amplitude of the subprocess nn→pp(ee) remains unknown, and only lattice quantum chromodynamics (QCD) can directly and reliably determine the associated low-energy constant. While the numerical computations of the correlation function for this process are underway with lattice QCD, the connection to the physical amplitude, and hence this short-distance contribution, is missing. A complete framework that enables this complex matching is developed in this Letter. The complications arising from the Euclidean and finite-volume nature of the corresponding correlation function are fully resolved, and the value of the formalism is demonstrated through a simple example. The result of this work, therefore, fills the gap between first-principles studies of the nn→pp(ee) amplitude from lattice QCD and those from effective field theory, and can be readily employed in the ongoing lattice-QCD studies of this process.

Ab Initio Neutrinoless Double-Beta Decay Matrix Elements for ^{48}Ca, ^{76}Ge, and ^{82}Se

We calculate basis-space converged neutrinoless ββ-decay nuclear matrix elements for the lightest candidates: ^{48}Ca, ^{76}Ge, and ^{82}Se. Starting from initial two- and three-nucleon forces, we apply the ab initio in-medium similarity renormalization group to construct valence-space Hamiltonians and consistently transformed ββ-decay operators. We find that the tensor component is non-negligible in ^{76}Ge and ^{82}Se, and the resulting nuclear matrix elements are overall 25%-45% smaller than those obtained from the phenomenological shell model. While a final matrix element with uncertainties still requires substantial developments, this work nevertheless opens a path toward a true first-principles calculation of neutrinoless ββ decay in all nuclei relevant for ongoing large-scale searches.

Present Status of Nuclear Shell-Model Calculations of 0νββ Decay Matrix Elements

Neutrinoless double beta (0νββ) decay searches are currently among the major foci of experimental physics. The observation of such a decay will have important implications in our understanding of the intrinsic nature of neutrinos and shed light on the limitations of the Standard Model. The rate of this process depends on both the unknown neutrino effective mass and the nuclear matrix element (M0ν) associated with the given 0νββ transition. The latter can only be provided by theoretical calculations, hence the need of accurate theoretical predictions of M0ν for the success of the experimental programs. This need drives the theoretical nuclear physics community to provide the most reliable calculations of M0ν. Among the various computational models adopted to solve the many-body nuclear problem, the shell model is widely considered as the basic framework of the microscopic description of the nucleus. Here, we review the most recent and advanced shell-model calculations of M0ν considering the light-neutrino-exchange channel for nuclei of experimental interest. We report the sensitivity of the theoretical calculations with respect to variations in the model spaces and the shell-model nuclear Hamiltonians.

Gamow-Teller Strength in ^{48}Ca and ^{78}Ni with the Charge-Exchange Subtracted Second Random-Phase Approximation

We develop a fully self-consistent subtracted second random-phase approximation for charge-exchange processes with Skyrme energy-density functionals. As a first application, we study Gamow-Teller excitations in the doubly magic nucleus ^{48}Ca, the lightest double-β emitter that could be used in an experiment, and in ^{78}Ni, the single-beta-decay rate of which is known. The amount of Gamow-Teller strength below 20 or 30 MeV is considerably smaller than in other energy-density-functional calculations and agrees better with experiment in ^{48}Ca, as does the beta-decay rate in ^{78}Ni. These important results, obtained without ad hoc quenching factors, are due to the presence of two-particle-two-hole configurations. Their density progressively increases with excitation energy, leading to a long high-energy tail in the spectrum, a fact that may have implications for the computation of nuclear matrix elements for neutrinoless double-β decay in the same framework.