1396 papers
Nuclear theory sits at the fascinating intersection of particle physics and the forces that hold our universe together. This field explores how protons and neutrons bind inside atomic nuclei, seeking to understand the fundamental interactions that govern matter at its most dense and energetic levels. While the mathematics involved can be incredibly complex, the core questions are deeply human: how does the universe function at its smallest scales, and what happens when we push matter to its limits?
At Gist.Science, we make these cutting-edge discoveries accessible by processing every new preprint published in this category on arXiv. Our team transforms dense academic manuscripts into clear, plain-language summaries alongside detailed technical overviews, ensuring that both experts and curious readers can grasp the latest breakthroughs without getting lost in the jargon. Below are the latest papers in nuclear theory, distilled and ready for you to explore.
This paper proposes a novel strategy to image the three-dimensional longitudinal structure of the quark-gluon plasma by comparing ultrarelativistic collisions of nuclei with similar masses but different shapes to isolate and remove nonflow correlations, thereby revealing previously inaccessible rapidity-dependent flow features.
This paper demonstrates that while semi-agnostic equation-of-state priors improve the accuracy of inferring nuclear empirical parameters from neutron star observations compared to traditional nucleonic models, the strong competition and degeneracy among these parameters at high densities make their independent determination challenging even with extremely precise measurements.
This paper proposes a unified framework for quantum chromodynamics in which topological gluon knots, characterized by the Hopf invariant within the Faddeev-Niemi effective theory, serve as the fundamental infrared degrees of freedom that simultaneously explain monopole condensation, Y-shaped baryon confinement, chiral symmetry breaking, and the origin of proton spin.
This paper presents the first Bayesian extraction of QCD baryon number susceptibilities from RHIC Beam Energy Scan data, revealing that while second-order susceptibilities align with lattice QCD predictions at low baryon density, they show significant enhancement at higher densities, whereas observed nonmonotonic trends in higher-order fluctuations can be explained by second-order effects and baryon number conservation without requiring irreducible multi-baryon correlations.
This study utilizes highly sensitive collinear laser spectroscopy to measure previously inaccessible properties of calcium isotopes, revealing a pure single-particle magnetic dipole moment in and an enhanced charge-radius slope toward , which together provide robust evidence for a strong shell closure.
This paper utilizes the Color Glass Condensate effective theory to demonstrate that gluonic nucleon energy correlators and fracture functions in the target fragmentation region are determined by the adjoint dipole -matrix, predicting a distinct azimuthal asymmetry sensitive to the saturation scale and exhibiting significant nuclear suppression, thereby offering a novel probe for gluon saturation at the future Electron-Ion Collider.
Using chiral perturbation theory with dimensional regularization, this paper analyzes the impact of a localized, inhomogeneous magnetic field on the QCD vacuum at zero temperature, demonstrating that equilibrium observables and induced vacuum currents can be precisely determined at next-to-leading order without undetermined parameters, thereby revealing the nonlocal spatial structure of the magnetized vacuum beyond locally constant approximations.
This paper proposes using neutrino-induced charged current coherent pion production events in the DUNE near detector as a "standard candle" to simultaneously constrain the muon neutrino flux normalization and cross-section uncertainties, potentially reducing flux normalization errors to a few percent.
This study employs the exact full configuration-interaction quantum Monte Carlo method to demonstrate that symmetric nuclear matter is strikingly strongly correlated, thereby challenging the validity of previous *ab initio* calculations that relied on truncated many-body expansions.
This study demonstrates that short-range correlations (SRCs) between nucleons leave a universal, linearly scalable imprint on the geometry fluctuations of the quark-gluon plasma formed in relativistic heavy-ion collisions, bridging structural insights from cold nuclear matter to high-energy collisions.