# Presentation: 119268

## A Vision forNuclear Theory

- Initiatives
- And
- Recommendations

- Report to NSAC – 13 September 2003

- *** PRELIMINARY ***

## Overview

- Committee and Charge
- Update on the 1988 “Koonin” Report
- Recent Achievements
- Scientific Opportunities
- Community Surveys
- Recommendations & Initiatives
- Budget Scenarios

## Membership

- Joseph Carlson (LANL)
- Barry Holstein (U. Massachusetts)
- Xiangdong Ji (U. Maryland)
- Gail McLaughlin (NCSU)
- Berndt Mueller (Duke) - Chair
- Witold Nazarewicz (UT/ORNL)
- Krishna Rajagopal (MIT)
- Winston Roberts (ODU/Jlab)
- Xin-Nian Wang (LBNL)
- Richard Casten (Ex-Officio)

## Charge to NSAC

- Part of recommendation I of NSAC Long Range Plan:
- 	“Significantly increase funding for nuclear theory, which is essential for developing the full potential of the scientific program.”
- Specific charge for NSAC Theory Subcommittee:
- 	“NSAC is asked to review and evaluate current NSF and DOE supported efforts in nuclear theory and identify strategic plans to ensure a strong U.S. nuclear theory program under various funding scenarios....”

## 1988 Recommendations

- 5-year plan to strengthen nuclear theory:
- 60-65 additional PhD level personnel
- 70% budget increase ($13M = 6%   $22M = 10%).
- Encourage creation and support theory groups at universities with strong experimental programs.
- Create one or more nuclear theory centers of truly national and interdisciplinary character.
- Include theoretical funding as integral part of new large experimental projects.
- Adequate access to supercomputers and workstations.
- Foster interactions between nuclear theorists.
- Add nuclear theorists as permanent program officers.

## Nuclear Theory Funding

## Theory Manpower

## Effort by Subfield

## Top-Rated Universities

| TABLE 4 | Professorial nuclear scientists at top-rated physics departments |  |  |  |  |  |  |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |
| University | Theorists |  | Experimentalists |  |  | Total |  |
|  | 1987 | 2003 | 1987 | 2003 |  | 1987 | 2003 |
| UC Berkeley | 0 | 0 | 3 | 1 |  | 3 | 1 |
| Caltech | 1 | 2 | 5 | 3 |  | 6 | 5 |
| Chicago | 0 | 2 | 2 | 1 |  | 2 | 3 |
| Columbia | 0 | 1 | 3 | 3 |  | 3 | 4 |
| Cornell | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |  | 0 | 0 |
| Harvard | 0 | 0 | 2 | 1 |  | 2 | 1 |
| Illinois | 5 | 2 | 10 | 9 |  | 15 | 11 |
| MIT | 7 | 5 | 8 | 9 |  | 15 | 14 |
| Princeton | 0 | 0 | 8 | 2 |  | 8 | 2 |
| Stanford | 0 | 0 | 3 | 1 |  | 3 | 1 |
| Total | 13 | 12 | 44 | 30 |  | 57 | 42 |

## Funding for Nuclear Theory

| TABLE 6 | Annual funding for nuclear theory (M$) |  |  |  |  |  |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  |  |  |  |  |  |  |
|  | FY87 (in 2003 $) |  |  | FY03 (in 2003 $) |  |  |
|   | NSF | DOE | Total | NSF | DOE | Total |
| Universities | 4.2 | 8.9 | 13.1 | 2.9 | 11.7 | 14.6 |
| National Labs |   | 7.3 | 7.3 |   | 9.5 | 9.5 |
| INT (Prog.) |   |  |   |   | 0.9 | 0.9 |
| Total | 4.2 | 16.1 | 20.3 | 2.9 | 22.1 | 25 |

## Support per Senior PhD

| TABLE 8 | Support per senior Ph.D. (k$) |  |  |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  |  |  |  |
|   | FY86 | FY86 | FY03 |
|   | (1986 $) | (2003 $) | (2003 $) |
| NSF | 42 | 70 | 73 |
| DOE Univ. | 71 | 118 | 114 |

- Serious discrepancy between NSF and DOE remains.

## Recent Achievements I

- General: Theory has provided, and is providing, guidance, justification, and planning of new facilities and highly complex experimental programs (JLab & upgrade, RHIC, RIA, NUSL, EIC, ...).
- QCD based EFT of nuclear forces.
- Ab-initio “exact” calculations of light nuclei.
- Microscopic theory of complex nuclei.
- Lattice QCD: QCD equation of state (Tc etc.), origin of chiral symmetry breaking, methodology for quantitative computation of hadron properties.

## Recent Achievements II

- Generalized parton distributions.
- Diagnostics of hot and dense matter (jets, flow, etc.).
- Theoretical framework for gluon saturation and universal hadron structure at small x (CGC).
- Color superconducting phases of cold, dense matter.
- Theoretical studies of type-II supernovae.
- Confirmation of the standard solar model and matter induced neutrino oscillations.
- Interdisciplinary many-body physics (condensed Bose gases, atomic clusters, random matrix theory, etc.)

## Institute for Nuclear Theory

- INT is a huge success (community consensus!):
- Excellent leadership and operation
- Programs have great intellectual impact
- INT has raised recognition of nuclear theory in the broader physics community
- DOE-NP deserves praise for creating and adequately supporting the INT
- DOE has significantly increased support for nuclear theory in real terms since 1988               – but the field has grown even faster!

## Opportunities I

- Lattice QCD:
- Methodology (improved actions, domain wall fermions, chiral extrapolations) is in place to calculate important observables with 5% precision or better;
- $1M/Tflops hardware makes 10+ Tflops facility affordable _now_;
- Wide range of program relevant questions are accessible:
- Structure of the QCD vacuum and Tc
- Structure of ground state hadrons, including exotics
- Form factors, generalized parton distributions, etc.
- QCD equation of state at >0
- Frontier I: spectral functions
- Frontier II: solutions of the fermion sign problem

## Opportunities II

- Quantitative analysis of JLab and RHIC experiments:
- Reaction theory for hadron spectroscopy
- Phenomenology of polarization observables for RHIC-SPIN
- Quantitative phenomenology of soft and hard probes of hot QCD matter
- Nuclear structure theory:
- Microscopic ab initio calculations of complex nuclei
- EFT phenomenology of nuclear interactions
- Universal energy density functional
- Unification of nuclear structure and reaction theory
- Microscopic understanding of symmetries and collective motion

## Opportunities III

- Nuclear astrophysics:
- Quantitative simulations of type-II supernovae (2D + 3D)
- Dynamics and nuclear physics of gamma-ray bursts
- Neutrino astrophysics
- Neutron star physics
- Tests of fundamental symmetries and search for Beyond Standard Model physics:
- EDM and cosmic baryon asymmetry
- Neutrinoless double beta decay
- Hadronic radiative corrections to symmetry violations
- Weak hadronic interactions

## Opportunities IV

- Soft collinear effective theory
- Thermalization and transport in QCD matter
- Interdisciplinary Many-Body Physics
- Strong coupling systems with pairing and disorder
- Solutions of the fermion sign problem (meron cluster alg’s, etc.)
- Condensed trapped Fermi and Bose gases
*Unifying theme:* Controlled precision calculations of quantities of experimental relevance in microscopic theoretical frameworks.

## Community Input

- Detailed survey of nuclear theory PIs and co-PIs:
- 74 responses from all subfields and age groups
- Responses confirm our analysis of scientific achievements and opportunities and support our recommendations
- Most urgent needs: Increased manpower, postdocs, bridged positions
- Questionnaire to experimental PIs
- 22 responses from different subfields
- Broad support for increased support for theory addressing critical needs of the national nuclear physics program

## Guiding Principles and Aims

- Ensure future excellence of nuclear theory in the U.S.
- Maximize effectiveness of nuclear theory research
- Develop increased manpower required to address scientific opportunities and programmatic needs
- Attract, train, and retain best possible talent
- Reverse decline of nuclear theory in top-rated physics departments
- Build program accountability into major new initiatives

## Priorities: Overview

- Postdoctoral prize fellowships
- Topical centers
- Centers of excellence
- Large scale computing initiatives
- Revitalization mechanisms
- Enhance NSF core grants
- Protect DOE core program

## Priorities: Manpower

- Postdoctoral prize fellowships:
- 5 awards annually for 3-year terms
- National selection committee
- Postdocs select host institution
- Raise visibility of best young nuclear theorists
- Enhance early career attractivity and opportunities
- Targeted manpower enhancements:
- Topical (“seeding”) centers
- Interdisciplinary centers of excellence
- 5-year terms; competitive renewal possible

## Priorities: Topical Centers I

- 2-3 centers per year to be awarded competitively on the basis of scientific quality and relevance to the national program, at $300-500k each.
- Proposals should contain “deliverable” results.
- Centers to function as hubs of wider networks.
- Centers could involve staff/faculty bridge funding.
- Review and possible competitive renewal after 5 years.
- Steady state: 10-12 topical centers in maximal scenario, creating 30-50 new staff/faculty and postdoc positions.

## Priorities: Topical Centers II

- Some examples of program relevant topics:
- systematic development of EFT description of nuclear forces
- properties of nuclei far from stability
- microscopic study of nuclear input parameters for astrophysics
- calculation of electroweak corrections to precision data
- microscopic nuclear reaction theory
- analysis of the spectrum of excited baryons (and mesons)
- phenomenology of hard probes of hot, dense matter
- phenomenology of thermal probes of hot matter
- simulations of core collapse supernovae
- lattice simulations of hadron properties
- lattice simulations of thermal QCD
*ab initio* many-body calculations
- phenomenology of neutrino oscillations
- etc ...

## Priorities: Centers of Excellence

- Interdisciplinary centers at universities or national labs targeting areas benefiting from intense interactions with scholars from other communities (astrophysics, CM physics, HE physics, etc.).
- Broad and curiosity driven research agenda.
- Flexible specific structure to accommodate special circumstances (from NSF PFC model to ...).
- Funding $0.5-1M/year; faculty bridge support could be an important component.
- 3-5 centers nationally.
- Review and competitive renewal after 5 years.

## Priorities: Computing

- Aggressive investment in computational nuclear science with the goal of solving problems of core importance to the physics program:
- Urgently needed investments include >10 teraflops scale national facilities to capitalize on immediate scientific opportunities: precise lattice QCD calculations of the structure of hadrons and dense matter,  realistic simulations of supernova dynamics, and *ab initio* solutions of quantum many-body problems.
- The opportunities are so compelling that even when new external resources, such as SciDAC, are unavailable or inadequate,  a minimal sum of $3M/year from the nuclear science budget should be allocated to computational nuclear physics with an appropriate share being borne by the nuclear theory program.
- Start longer term planning for >100 teraflops facility.
- Utilize synergies with HEP initiatives.

## Priorities: Revitalization

- Bridge positions:
- Funding agencies should expand existing practice of bridging new faculty and staff positions
- Peer review of proposals
- OJI / CAREER programs:
- Continue very successful OJI program, but
- Increase OJI grants to ≥100k/year budget
- Allow national lab staff to compete
- Graduate students:
- Develop attractive fellowship program
- Start new REU programs led by nuclear theorists
- Sabbatical leaves
- home inst. 50%, host inst. 25%, agency 25%

## Priorities: Base Program

- NSF  base program:
- Raise $70k/PI funding to DOE level (>$110k/PI) even in a constant level of effort scenario
- Make best theory groups and single PIs more effective
- Make NSF program more attractive to best young theorists
- Raise competitiveness of NSF nuclear theory program with respect to other theory areas.
- Aim at 50% growth of nuclear theory funding
- DOE base program:
- Modest decrease in constant level of effort scenario
- Protect core program in growth scenarios

## Budget Scenarios I

| Initiative | Constant Effort | Option I | Option II | Option III |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  |  |  |  |  |
| Postdoc Fellows | 0.6 | 1.2 | 1.2 | 1.2 |
| Topical Centers |  | 1.0 | 2.5 | 4.0 |
| Centers of Excellence | 0.5 | 1.5 | 2.5 | 3.5 |
| Computing | 0.2 | 1.0 | 2.0 | 3.0 |
| Graduate students | -0.6 | -0.2 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Enhanced OJIs |  | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.5 |
| NSF base budget | 0.0 | 0.6 | 1.0 | 1.5 |
| DOE base budget | -0.7 |  |  |  |
| Total | 0.0 | 5.6 | 9.7 | 13.7 |
| Current NP Theory | 25.0 | 25.0 | 25.0 | 25.0 |
| Future NP Theory | 25.0 | 30.6 | 34.7 | 38.7 |
| Increase (%) | 0 | 22 | 39 | 55 |

## Budget Scenarios II

- M$

## Budget Scenarios III

- $M