SHELL CLOSURE AND jj COUPLING

Publisher Summary It is possible to account for the general features of nuclear “matter” on the basis of the pair of particle forces. The approximate description of nuclear structure is usually called “nuclear shell model” or more precisely “model of individual orbits,” or “Hartree model.” It is quite analogous to the successful and well-known orbital description of the electronic shells of the atom. In a study described in the chapter, “magic numbers” and “shell numbers” have been used indiscriminately. This chapter explains the difference of behaviour from the different type of forces, which lead to “saturation” in the nuclear case but not in the atomic case. The singularities of the nucleon–nucleon forces render the methods of conventional perturbation theory inapplicable.