Short-Range Correlations in Light to Medium-Mass Nuclei from Effective Field Theory
Joel Lynn (Darmstadt)

Nuclei are complex, strongly interacting, many-body quantum systems. While we know that the underlying theory responsible for the strong interactions between protons and neutrons is quantum chromodynamics (QCD), due to the nature of nonabelian gauge theories (confinement/asymptotic freedom) QCD is nonperturbative at the low energies in which we are often interested. One approach around this difficulty, as I will describe in this talk, is to treat the protons and neutrons themselves as the proper degrees of freedom and connect to QCD through effective field theory (EFT) techniques. Even so, we are still faced with a challenging many-body problem and some numerical method is required. Many options are available, but I will focus on quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) methods. Combining these two approaches, EFT and QMC methods, opens a new window onto the nuclear landscape. I will demonstrate some of the novel insights we have gained looking through this window by discussing one of the most talked about but least understood discoveries in nuclear physics: The so-called “EMC effect” and its connection to short-range correlations in nuclei, both of which are the subjects of ongoing experimental campaigns.