Density slope of the nuclear symmetry energy from the neutron skin thickness of heavy nuclei
Expressing explicitly the parameters of the standard Skyrme interaction in terms of the macroscopic properties of asymmetric nuclear matter, we show in the Skyrme-Hartree-Fock approach that unambiguous correlations exist between observables of finite nuclei and nuclear matter properties. We find that existing data on neutron skin thickness $\ensuremath{\Delta}{r}_{\mathit{np}}$ of Sn isotopes give an important constraint on the symmetry energy ${E}_{\mathrm{sym}}({\ensuremath{\rho}}_{0})$ and its density slope $L$ at saturation density ${\ensuremath{\rho}}_{0}$. Combining these constraints with those from recent analyses of isospin diffusion and the double neutron/proton ratio in heavy-ion collisions at intermediate energies leads to a more stringent limit on $L$ approximately independent of ${E}_{\mathrm{sym}}({\ensuremath{\rho}}_{0})$. The implication of these new constraints on the $\ensuremath{\Delta}{r}_{\mathit{np}}$ of $^{208}\mathrm{Pb}$ as well as the core-crust transition density and pressure in neutron stars is discussed.

title: Nuclear constraints on non-Newtonian gravity at femtometer scale
abstract: Effects of the non-Newtonian gravity on properties of finite nuclei are studied by consistently incorporating both the direct and exchange contribution of the Yukawa potential in the Hartree–Fock approach using a well-tested Skyrme force for the strong interaction. It is shown for the first time that the strength of the Yukawa term in the non-Newtonian gravity is limited to log (|α|) < 1.75/[λ(fm)]0.54 + 33.6 within the length scale of λ = 1 − 10 fm in order for the calculated properties of finite nuclei not to be in conflict with accurate experimental data available.

title: Shear viscosity of nuclear matter
abstract: In this talk I report my recent study on the shear viscosity of neutron-rich nuclear matter from a relaxation time approach. An isospinand momentum-dependent interaction is used in the study. Effects of density, temperature, and isospin asymmetry of nuclear matter on its shear viscosity have been discussed. Similar to the symmetry energy, the symmetry shear viscosity is defined and its density and temperature dependence are studied.

title: Non-Newtonian gravity in finite nuclei
abstract: In this talk, we report our recent study of constraining the non-Newtonian gravity at femtometer scale. We incorporate the Yukawa-type non-Newtonian gravitational potential consistently to the Skyrme functional form using the exact treatment for the direct contribution and density-matrix expansion method for the exchange contribution. The effects from the non-Newtonian potential on finite nuclei properties are then studied together with a well-tested Skyrme force. Assuming that the framework without non-Newtonian gravity can explain the binding energies and charge radii of medium to heavy nuclei within 2% error, we set an upper limit for the strength of the non-Newtonian gravitational potential at femtometer scale.

title: Locating the inner edge of the neutron star crust using terrestrial nuclear laboratory data
abstract: Within both dynamical and thermodynamical approaches using the equation of state for neutron-rich nuclear matter constrained by the recent isospin diffusion data from heavy-ion reactions in the same subsaturation density range as the neutron star crust, the density and pressure at the inner edge separating the liquid core from the solid crust of neutron stars are determined to be $0.040 {\mathrm{fm}}^{\ensuremath{-}3}\ensuremath{\leqslant}{\ensuremath{\rho}}_{t}\ensuremath{\leqslant}0.065 {\mathrm{fm}}^{\ensuremath{-}3}$ and 0.01 MeV/${\mathrm{fm}}^{3}\ensuremath{\leqslant}{P}_{t}\ensuremath{\leqslant}0.26$ MeV/${\mathrm{fm}}^{3}$, respectively. These together with the observed minimum crustal fraction of the total moment of inertia allow us to set a new limit for the radius of the Vela pulsar significantly different from the previous estimate. It is further shown that the widely used parabolic approximation to the equation of state of asymmetric nuclear matter leads systematically to significantly higher core-crust transition densities and pressures, especially with stiffer symmetry energy functionals.

title: Temperature effects on the nuclear symmetry energy and symmetry free energy with an isospin and momentum dependent interaction
abstract: Within a self-consistent thermal model using an isospin and momentum dependent interaction (MDI) constrained by the isospin diffusion data in heavy-ion collisions, we investigate the temperature dependence of the symmetry energy ${E}_{\mathrm{sym}}(\ensuremath{\rho},T)$ and symmetry free energy ${F}_{\mathrm{sym}}(\ensuremath{\rho},T)$ for hot, isospin asymmetric nuclear matter. It is shown that the symmetry energy ${E}_{\mathrm{sym}}(\ensuremath{\rho},T)$ generally decreases with increasing temperature while the symmetry free energy ${F}_{\mathrm{sym}}(\ensuremath{\rho},T)$ exhibits opposite temperature dependence. The decrement of the symmetry energy with temperature is essentially due to the decrement of the potential energy part of the symmetry energy with temperature. The difference between the symmetry energy and symmetry free energy is found to be quite small around the saturation density of nuclear matter. While at very low densities, they differ significantly from each other. In comparison with the experimental data of temperature dependent symmetry energy extracted from the isotopic scaling analysis of intermediate mass fragments (IMF's) in heavy-ion collisions, the resulting density and temperature dependent symmetry energy ${E}_{\mathrm{sym}}(\ensuremath{\rho},T)$ is then used to estimate the average freeze-out density of the IMF's.

title: Azimuthal jet flavor tomography with CUJET2.0 of nuclear collisions at RHIC and LHC
abstract: A bstractA perturbative QCD based jet tomographic Monte Carlo model, CUJET2.0, is presented to predict jet quenching observables in relativistic heavy ion collisions at RHIC/BNL and LHC/CERN energies. This model generalizes the DGLV theory of flavor dependent radiative energy loss by including multi-scale running strong coupling effects. It generalizes CUJET1.0 by computing jet path integrations though more realistic 2 + 1D transverse and longitudinally expanding viscous hydrodynamical fields contrained by fits to low pT flow data. The CUJET2.0 output depends on three control parameters, (αmax, fE, fM ), corresponding to an assumed upper bound on the vacuum running coupling in the infrared and two chromo-electric and magnetic QGP screening mass scales (fEμ(T ), fMμ(T )) where μ(T ) is the 1-loop Debye mass. We compare numerical results as a function of αmax for pure and deformed HTL dynamically enhanced scattering cases corresponding to (fE = 1, 2, fM = 0) to data of the nuclear modification factor, RAAf(pT, ϕ; s,b$$ \sqrt{s}, b $$) for jet fragment flavors f = π, D, B, e at s$$ \sqrt{s} $$ = 0.2 − 2.76 ATeV c.m. energies per nucleon pair and with impact parameter b = 2.4, 7.5 fm. A χ2 analysis is presented and shows that RAAπ data from RHIC and LHC are consistent with CUJET2.0 at the χ2/d.o.f < 2 level for αmax = 0.23 − 0.30. The corresponding q^$$ \widehat{q} $$(Ejet, T )/T3 effective jet transport coefficient field of this model is computed to facilitate comparison to other jet tomographic models in the literature. The predicted elliptic asymmetry, v2(pT ; s$$ \sqrt{s} $$, b) is, however, found to significantly underestimated relative to RHIC and LHC data. We find the χv22$$ {\chi}_{v_2}^2 $$ analysis shows that v2 is very sensitive to allowing even as little as 10% variations of the path averaged αmax along in and out of reaction plane paths.

title: A Tapered Dielectric Structure for Laser Acceleration at Low Energy
abstract: This paper extends the physics of the Micro-Accelerator Platform (MAP), which is in development as an optical structure for laser acceleration of relativistic electrons. The MAP is a resonant, optical-scale, slab-symmetric device that is fabricated from dielectric materials using layer-deposition techniques. For stand-alone applications, low-energy electrons ( ~ 0.3) must be synchronously accelerated to relativistic speeds for injection into the MAP. Even lower energies are desired for other particle species (e.g. protons or muons). In this paper, we present design and simulation studies on a tapered geometry and associated coupling scheme that can produce synchronous acceleration at < 1 within a MAP-like structure.

title: Extracting the jet transport coefficient from jet quenching in high-energy heavy-ion collisions
abstract: Within five different approaches to parton propagation and energy loss in dense matter, a phenomenological study of experimental data on suppression of large $p_T$ single inclusive hadrons in heavy-ion collisions at both RHIC and LHC was carried out. The evolution of bulk medium used in the study for parton propagation was given by 2+1D or 3+1D hydrodynamic models which are also constrained by experimental data on bulk hadron spectra. Values for the jet transport parameter $\hat q$ at the center of the most central heavy-ion collisions are extracted or calculated within each model, with parameters for the medium properties that are constrained by experimental data on the hadron suppression factor $R_{AA}$. For a quark with initial energy of 10 GeV we find that $\hat q\approx 1.2 \pm 0.3$ GeV$^2$/fm at an initial time $\tau_0=0.6$ fm/$c$ in Au+Au collisions at $\sqrt{s}=200$ GeV/n and $\hat q\approx 1.9 \pm 0.7 $ GeV$^2$/fm in Pb+Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s}=2.76 $ TeV/n. Compared to earlier studies, these represent significant convergence on values of the extracted jet transport parameter, reflecting recent advances in theory and the availability of new experiment data from the LHC.

title: 12CO J=2?1 and 12CO J=3?2 observations toward the high-mass protostellar candidate IRAS 20188+3928
abstract: We have carried out observations of 12 CO J =2–1 and 12 CO J =3–2 toward the high-mass protostellar candidate IRAS 20188+3928. Compared with previous observations, the 12 CO J =2–1 and 12 CO J =3–2 lines both have asymmetric profiles with an absorption dip. The velocity of the absorption dip is ~ 1.0 km s −1 . The spectral shape may be caused by rotation. The velocity-integrated intensity map and position-velocity diagram of the 12 CO J =2–1 line present an obvious bipolar component, further verifying that this region has an outflow motion. This region is also associated with an HII region, an IRAS source, and an H 2 O maser. The H 2 O maser has the velocity of 1.1 km s −1 . Compared with the components of the outflow, we find that the H 2 O maser is not associated with the outflow. Using the large velocity gradient model, we concluded that possible averaged gas densities of the blueshifted lobe and redshifted lobe are 1.0×10 5 cm −3 and 2.0×10 4 cm −3 , while kinetic temperatures are 26.9 K and 52.9 K, respectively. Additionally, the outflow has a higher integrated intensity ratio ( I CO J =3−2 / I CO J =2−1 ).

title: The tricky azimuthal dependence of jet quenching at RHIC and LHC via CUJET2.0
abstract: High transverse momentum neutral pion and charged hadron suppression pattern with respect to reaction plane at RHIC and LHC energies in central and semi-peripheral AA collisions are studied in a perturbative QCD based model, CUJET2.0. CUJET2.0 has dynamical DGLV radiation kernel and Thoma–Gyulassy elastic energy loss, with both being generalized to including multi-scale running strong coupling as well as energy loss probability fluctuations, and the full jet path integration is performed in a low p T flow data constrained medium which has 2+1D viscous hydrodynamical expanding profile. We find that in CUJET2.0, with only one control parameter, α max , the maximum coupling strength, fixed to be 0.26, the computed nuclear modification factor R AA in central and semi-peripheral AA collisions are consistent with RHIC and LHC data at average χ 2 / d.o.f. 1.5 level. Simultaneous agreements with high p T azimuthal anisotropy v 2 data are acquired given average α max over in-plane and out-of-plane paths varying as little as 10%, suggesting a non-trivial dependence of the high p T single particle v 2 on the azimuthally varied strong coupling.