On the statistical method in nuclear theory
Open Access
- 8 March 1940
- journal article
- Published by The Royal Society in Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series A. Mathematical and Physical Sciences
- Vol. 174 (959) , 509-522
- https://doi.org/10.1098/rspa.1940.0036
Abstract
The calculation of the energies of heavy nuclei presents a many-body problem with a very large number of particles. For the treatment of this problem the statistical method seems to be indispensable. But the statistical method, as applied hitherto in nuclear physics, has some serious drawbacks. It proceeds from the Hartree approximation, each particle being supposed to move in the average field of the other particles. With this approximation the total wave function can be represented by a determinant of independent wave functions. The calculation of the energy then leads to expressions containing the wave functions only in the form of densities or mixed densities ρ(r) = Σi ϕ*i (r) ϕi(r); ρ(r, r') = Σ i+j ϕ*i (r) ϕ*j (r') ϕi(r') ϕj(r), (1.1) where the summation extends over all independent wave functions.Keywords
This publication has 1 reference indexed in Scilit:
- Calculation of nuclear energies and stability by the statistical methodProceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series A. Mathematical and Physical Sciences, 1940