Eur. Phys. J. A (2015) 51: 162
https://doi.org/10.1140/epja/i2015-15162-4

Regular Article - Theoretical Physics

Ab initio-driven nuclear energy density functional method

A proposal for safe/correlated/improvable parametrizations of the off-diagonal EDF kernels

¹ CEA, Centre de Saclay, IRFU/Service de Physique Nucléaire, F-91191, Gif-sur-Yvette, France
² KU Leuven, Instituut voor Kern- en Stralingsfysica, 3001, Leuven, Belgium
³ National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory and Department of Physics and Astronomy, Michigan State University, 48824, East Lansing, MI, USA
⁴ Université Bordeaux, Centre d’Etudes Nucléaires de Bordeaux Gradignan, UMR5797, F-33175, Gradignan, France
⁵ CNRS/IN2P3, Centre d’Etudes Nucléaires de Bordeaux Gradignan, UMR5797, F-33175, Gradignan, France
⁶ CEA, DAM, DIF, F-91297, Arpajon, France

^* e-mail: thomas.duguet@cea.fr

Received: 12 February 2015
Accepted: 30 June 2015
Published online: 23 December 2015

Abstract

This programmatic paper lays down the possibility to reconcile the necessity to resum many-body correlations into the energy kernel with the fact that safe multi-reference energy density functional (EDF) calculations cannot be achieved whenever the Pauli principle is not enforced, as is for example the case when many-body correlations are parametrized under the form of empirical density dependencies. Our proposal is to exploit a newly developed ab initio many-body formalism to guide the construction of safe, explicitly correlated and systematically improvable parametrizations of the off-diagonal energy and norm kernels that lie at the heart of the nuclear EDF method. The many-body formalism of interest relies on the concepts of symmetry breaking and restoration that have made the fortune of the nuclear EDF method and is, as such, amenable to this guidance. After elaborating on our proposal, we briefly outline the project we plan to execute in the years to come.