CAREER: From Fundamental Interactions to Emergent Phenomena: Geometrical Aspects of Nuclear Dynamics

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The advent of experimental facilities with beams of radioactive, or unstable, atomic nuclei opens up new opportunities for the low-energy nuclear physics community to study the properties of rare nuclear isotopes, improve the understanding of fundamental interactions, and develop applications with direct societal impact, including in medicine, homeland security, and industry. Experimental information on exotic nuclear systems plays a key role for understanding the elemental composition of the universe and for predicting the evolution of stars and galaxies. In this context, nuclear theory is called upon to provide missing information about exotic nuclei that are not accessible experimentally. To this effort, this project will contribute an implementation of novel ideas on nuclear dynamics. The theory will be benchmarked against state-of-the-art experimental data. In addition to training graduate students by engaging them in this research, the project includes outreach and education activities, such as art-science exhibitions and graduate courses, aimed at attracting young talents to the field of nuclear physics. This project addresses fundamental theoretical questions about the microscopic mechanisms responsible for the binding of loosely-bound nuclei, their shapes and decay properties, and for spectra of their excitations. The project emphasizes the geometrical aspects of nuclear dynamics: intrinsic deformations, coupling to the continuum, and shapes and spatial density distributions associated with nuclear superfluidity. The approach developed here will account for emergent collective phenomena in medium-mass and heavy nuclei with higher accuracy and predictive power that are crucial for astrophysical applications. Comparison to results of recent and future experiments at major nuclear physics facilities, such as NSCL/FRIB and RIKEN, will constrain both the underlying nuclear forces and the many-body coupling mechanisms included in the theory.