Microscopic Optical Potentials from First Principles

Abstract

We construct nucleonic microscopic optical potentials by combining the Green’s function approach with the coupled-cluster method for (formula presented) and (formula presented). We work with the chiral nucleon-nucleon and three-nucleon interaction (formula presented) which reproduces the charge radii of (formula presented)Ca and (formula presented)Ca. The overall form of the neutron scattering cross section is reproduced for both nuclei, but the imaginary part of the calculated potential, which reflects the loss of flux in the elastic channel, is negligible. The latter points to many-body correlations that would appear beyond the coupled-cluster truncation level considered in this work. We show that, by artificially increasing the parameter (formula presented) in the Green’s function, practical results can be further improved.