New Geiger-Nuttall law for alpha decay of heavy nuclei

title: Temporal variation of the fine structure constant and the strong interaction parameter in the 229Th transition
abstract: The very low energy ( 7.6 ± 0.5 eV ) of the long-lived isomer state in 229Th has inspired the idea that the transition between this isomer and the ground state might be used to measure the temporal variation of some fundamental physical constants with great enhanced sensitivity in laboratory. Physicists have used several models to test whether this significantly enhanced sensitivity does exist. However, incongruous conclusions were reached. Based on the formulae derived from Feynman–Hellmann theorem, we reexamine the physics involved in those argument by the relativistic mean field theory. The results show that the correlation between the nuclear strong interaction and Coulomb force is important and cannot be neglected. The sensitivity to variations of fine structure constant, nucleon mass and meson masses could be enhanced by several orders of magnitude in the 229Th transition.

title: Nuclear charge radii of heavy and superheavy nuclei from the experimental alpha-decay energies and half-lives
abstract: The radius of a nucleus is one of the important quantities in nuclear physics. Although there are many researches on ground-state properties of superheavy nuclei, researches on charge radii of superheavy nuclei are rare. In this article, nuclear root-mean-square (rms) charge radii of heavy and superheavy nuclei are extracted from the experimental alpha-decay data. alpha-decay calculations are performed within the generalized density-dependent cluster model, where alpha-decay half-lives are evaluated using quasibound state wave functions. The charge distribution of daughter nuclei is determined in the double-folding model to reproduce the experimental alpha-decay half-lives. The rms charge radius is then calculated using the resulting charge distribution. In addition, a simple formula is also proposed to calculate nuclear charge radii with the experimental alpha-decay energies and half-lives. The formula is directly derived from the Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin barrier penetration probability with some approximations. The two different methods show good agreement with the experimental data for even-even nuclei, and the deduced results are consistent with other theoretical models. Moreover, nuclear radii of heavy and superheavy nuclei with Z = 98-116 are extracted from the alpha-decay data, for which alpha decay is a unique tool to probe nuclear sizes at present. This is the first result on nuclear charge radii of superheavy nuclei based on the experimental alpha-decay data.

title: Probe the $2s_{1/2}$ and $1d_{3/2}$ state level inversion with electron-nucleus scattering
abstract: The neutron-rich even-even nuclei 26–40Mg, 28–46Si, 30–48S, and 32–56Ar are calculated with the RMF model and the phase-shift electron scattering method. Results show that level inversion of the 2s1/2 and 1d3/2 proton states may occur for the magnesium, silicon, sulphur, and argon isotopes with more neutrons away from the stability line. Calculations show that the variation of the central charge densities for 30–48S, and 32–56Ar are very sensitive to the 2s1/2 and 1d3/2 proton state level inversion, and the level inversion can lead to a large measurable central charge depletion to the charge density distributions for the neutron-rich isotopes. Calculations also show that the charge density differences between the isotopes with and without central charge depletion can reveal not only the level inversion of the 2s1/2 and 1d3/2 proton states but also the behavior of the proton wave functions of both states. The results can provide references for the possible study of the nuclear level inversion and nuclear bubble phenomenon with electron scattering off short-lived nuclei at RIKEN or/and GSI in the future. In addition, direct nuclear reaction 44S(n, d)43P or 44S(3H, α)43P might also be a possible way to study the 2s1/2 and 1d3/2 proton state level inversion.

title: Relativistic mean-field description of a proton halo in the first excited ( 1 / 2 ) + state of 17 F
abstract: The newly discovered proton halo in the first excited ${(1/2)}^{+}$ state of ${}^{17}$F [R. Morlock et al.,  (1997)] is investigated in the nonlinear relativistic mean-field model. It is shown that this model, without introducing any specifically adjusted parameters, can reproduce well not only the ground state properties of ${}^{17}$F but also the proton halo in the excited ${(1/2)}^{+}$ state. The possibility of the existence of a proton halo in the neighboring nucleus ${}^{18}$Ne is also discussed.

title: Relativistic eikonal approaches to parity violating electron-nucleus scattering
abstract: The Coulomb electron scattering on even-even nuclei and the magnetic electron scattering on odd-$A$ nuclei have been investigated in the relativistic eikonal approximation and in the plane wave Born approximation, respectively. In this article, we generalize the relativistic eikonal approximation to the parity violating electron scattering on even-even nuclei. The parity violating asymmetries at electron energy of 850 MeV are calculated for three typical cases: Ca isotopes, $N=50$ isotones, and $N=Z$ doubly magic nuclei. In calculations the proton and neutron densities are obtained from the relativistic mean-field theory. The parity violating asymmetries are analyzed by comparing both the form factors and the densities of neutrons and protons. It is found that the parity violating asymmetries are sensitive to the differences between neutron and proton densities. Our results provide useful references for the parity violating electron-nucleus scattering experiments in the future.

title: Search for new phenomena in photon + jet events collected in proton-proton collisions at s=8 TeV with the ATLAS detector
abstract: This Letter describes a model-independent search for the production of new resonances in photon + jet (gamma + jet) events using 20 fb(-1) of proton-proton LHC data recorded with the ATLAS detector ...

title: Observation of a new particle in the search for the Standard Model Higgs boson with the ATLAS detector at the LHC
abstract: A search for the Standard Model Higgs boson in proton–proton collisions with the ATLAS detector at the LHC is presented. The datasets used correspond to integrated luminosities of approximately 4.8 fb−1 collected at View the MathML source in 2011 and 5.8 fb−1 at View the MathML source in 2012. Individual searches in the channels H→ZZ(⁎)→4l, H→γγ and H→WW(⁎)→eνμν in the 8 TeV data are combined with previously published results of searches for H→ZZ(⁎), WW(⁎), View the MathML source and τ+τ− in the 7 TeV data and results from improved analyses of the H→ZZ(⁎)→4l and H→γγ channels in the 7 TeV data. Clear evidence for the production of a neutral boson with a measured mass of View the MathML source is presented. This observation, which has a significance of 5.9 standard deviations, corresponding to a background fluctuation probability of 1.7×10−9, is compatible with the production and decay of the Standard Model Higgs boson.

title: Diffractive photoproduction of dijets in ep collisions at HERA
abstract: Diffractive photoproduction of dijets was measured with the ZEUS detector at the ep collider HERA using an integrated luminosity of 77.2 pb-1. The measurements were made in the kinematic range Q2 < 1 GeV2, 0.20<y<0.85 and xIP<0.025, where Q2 is the photon virtuality, y is the inelasticity and xIP is the fraction of the proton momentum taken by the diffractive exchange. The two jets with the highest transverse energy, ETjet, were required to satisfy ETjet>7.5 and 6.5 GeV, respectively, and to lie in the pseudorapidity range -1.5<ηjet<1.5. Differential cross sections were compared to perturbative QCD calculations using available parameterisations of diffractive parton distributions of the proton.

title: Photoproduction of events with rapidity gaps between jets at HERA
abstract: The photoproduction of dijet events, where the two jets with the highest transverse energy are separated by a large gap in pseudorapidity, have been studied with the ZEUS detector using an integrated luminosity of 39 pb-1. Rapidity-gap events are defined in terms of the energy flow between the jets, such that the total summed transverse energy in this region is less than some value ETCUT. The data show a clear excess over the predictions of standard photoproduction models. This is interpreted as evidence for a strongly interacting exchange of a color-singlet object. Monte Carlo models which include such a color-singlet exchange are able to describe the data.

title: Measurement of heavy-quark jet photoproduction at HERA
abstract: Photoproduction of beauty and charm quarks in events with at least two jets has been measured with the ZEUS detector at HERA using an integrated luminosity of 133 pb−1. The fractions of jets containing b and c quarks were extracted using the invariant mass of charged tracks associated with secondary vertices and the decay-length significance of these vertices. Differential cross sections as a function of jet transverse momentum, $p_{\mathrm {T}}^{\mathrm{jet}}$, and pseudorapidity, ηjet, were measured. The data are compared with previous measurements and are well described by next-to-leading-order QCD predictions.