931 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 provides direct experimental evidence for quark confinement within the proton by demonstrating that the force between quarks is attractive and constant across a wide range of positions, derived from available data and Quantum Chromodynamics.
This paper employs the local operator-product-expansion method to independently derive twist-2 relations, specifically a Wandzura-Wilczek-like relation and a Burkhardt-Cottingham-like sum rule, for the twist-3 tensor-polarized distribution function of spin-1 hadrons, thereby providing a robust theoretical foundation for upcoming electron-deuteron deep inelastic scattering experiments at JLab.
By employing a Bayesian weighting framework that integrates multimessenger observations (including GW170817, NICER, and candidate compact objects) with hybrid equations of state, this study determines that the maximum neutron star mass is robustly constrained to approximately 2.2–2.3 solar masses while the corresponding radius depends more strongly on the underlying hadronic model, typically falling near 12 km.
This paper presents predictions for coherent and incoherent J/ψ production in oxygen and neon ultra-peripheral collisions using an impact-parameter-dependent color glass condensate framework, demonstrating that these measurements can constrain small-x nuclear structure and reveal systematic saturation effects that increase with nuclear mass and energy.
This paper introduces MuDirac 1.3.0, a sustainable and efficient open-source software tool that enables the negative muon community to accurately calculate nuclear properties, such as the charge radius, by modeling muonic X-ray transition energies under a two-parameter Fermi distribution.
This paper presents a coupled-channel formalism to describe the tunneling time of a quantum particle through composite compounds with multiple energy levels or complex structures, which can be modeled as quasi-one-dimensional multi-channel systems.
This paper proposes a novel detection scheme for QCD axions in the to eV mass range by utilizing piezoelectric materials to generate a significantly enhanced axion-mediated force that induces resonant nuclear spin precession in a nearby sample.
This paper presents a theoretical framework based on the unified electroweak theory and multipole expansion to analyze polarized electron scattering from light nuclei (Li and Be), revealing that while longitudinal polarization and weak interaction are uncorrelated at zero-degree scattering, a strong correlation emerges at other angles for electron energies exceeding 10 GeV, thereby providing deeper insights into nuclear structure and the role of electron polarization.
This paper demonstrates that at higher temperatures, chiral plasma instability can generate strong magnetic fields even with small initial chiral imbalances, and reveals a novel mechanism where the chiral magnetic effect driven by density fluctuations causes significant Joule heating, potentially playing a critical role in the dynamics of supernovae and neutron star mergers.
This paper demonstrates that high-quality internucleon forces derived from chiral effective field theory exhibit a dominant Wigner's supermultiplet symmetry in light nuclei, a finding that enables the reduction of complex many-body bases in *ab initio* calculations by concentrating wave functions into a few key symmetry-adapted configurations.