Nuclear Physics

 Name M.Qasim

 Reg No. L1F16BSPH7007

 Assignment 2

Submitted To:- Prof.Saad Tariq

 Shell Model
The basic assumption of shell model is that nucleons move around in a nucleus in
average potential rather freely.This is apparent contradiction with bohr idea of
liquid drop model in which the particles are supposed to be highly interacting with
each other. This paradox is, however, resolved if we consider Pauli’s exclusion
principle which says that no two nucleons can be in the same state.

 In other words, even if a nucleon hits another nucleon inside the nucleus no
transfer of energy will take place since the other nucleon will have to be
raised on the energy level but the nucleus being a degenerate gas, the higher
levels are already filled up.
 The underlying idea of shell model is that nucleons move in orbits of
definite energy and angular momentum and that the outstanding stability of
the nuclides in due to the completion of a neutron or proton shell in the same
way as the stability of the rare gas atoms is due to completion of an electron
shell.

Nucleus is complicated by two factors:

 The “central” potential is really an average potential and the addition of an

extra nucleon modifies this potential far more than the addition of an
electron in the atomic case.
 Because of the Coulomb repulsion of the protons, the number of neutrons
and protons in a nucleus are not even approximately the same in all but the
lightest nuclides. It is, therefore, most unlikely that a nuclide with a closed
shell number of neutrons can also have a closed number of protons and vice
versa.

Magic Numbers
It is found that the numbers of neutrons or protons lead to particular stability, 2, 8,
20, 28, 50, 82, 126. These are called Magic numbers.Particular nuclei ought to be

are .

These are so called doubly magic numbers in which both neutrons and protons
have magic numbers.
Evidence for Magic Numbers from Abundances
 The number of stable and long-lived isotopes is greater at N = 20 (five), N =
28 (five), N = 50 (six) and N = 82 (seven) than for any other even N close
by.
 The study of absolute abundances show peaks at Zr (50 neutrons), Sn (50
protons), Ba (82 neutrons) and Pb (82 protons or 126 neutrons).Thus these
elements are more abundant than their neighbors.
 There are several exceptions to the statement that the relative abundance of
an even A isotope is in general much less than 60 %. In these exceptional
cases, N is either 50 or 82.

Evidence for Magic Numbers from Stability

 Data show a sharp reduction in the binding energy of the last nucleon added
to the magic number nuclei, for example for a neutron added to N = 126 and
a proton added to Z = 82 nuclides.
 The plot of the binding energy per nucleon against mass number shows
special stability for the higher magic numbers.


The shell binding energy of the odd particle makes neutron emission
possible at relatively low excitation energies.

Predictions of the Shell Model

 Abundances and Stability of the Closed Shell Nuclei
 The Spins of Nuclear Ground States

Abundances and Stability of the Closed Shell Nuclei

 Direct mass measurements show marked breaks in the mass defect curve for
nuclei with Z = 20, 28, 50 and N = 20, 28, 50.
 The number of stable species become markedly larger for N = 20, 28, 50, 82
than for nearby N values. Among the rare earths where chemical processes
in nature can not much affect the original abundances, the isotopes with N =
82 are outstandingly abundant.
  The neutron binding energy is specially high for nuclei with N = 50 and 82.
 These facts show the extra stability of closed-shell nuclei.
 The strong tendency to asymmetric fission by thermal neutrons seems to be
a dynamic effect of some complexity but again it depends on the marked
stability of the closed nucleon shell, so that the most favored fragments are
those with N = 82 and their compliments.

The Spins of Nuclear Ground States

 All observed nuclei with even Z and even N = A − Z, are spherically

symmetric in the ground state, with J = 0. This is the simplest line of
evidence for the rule for pairing off the angular momenta for nuclei with Z
odd, N even or with Z even, N odd which follows from the model nearly
uniquely.
 Because of the pairing energy, an even number of like nucleons in the partly
closed subshell form pairs so that their contribution to the ground-state
angular momentum is 0+. If the total number of neutrons (protons) in the
subshell is odd, one will, of course, remain unpaired.

These considerations lead to the following rules for the angular momenta and
parities of nuclear ground states.

 Even-even nuclei, that is, nuclei with even Z and even N, have total ground-
state angular momentum J = 0+. There is no known exception to the rule.
 An odd nucleus, that is, a nucleus with odd Z or odd N, will have a total
groundstate angular momentum equal to the half-integral angular
momentum J and the parity (−1)l of the unpaired particle. These are no
exceptions to this rule.
 An odd-odd nucleus will have a total angular momentum which is the vector
sum of the odd-neutron and odd-proton I –values
 Observed angular momenta of nuclear ground states provide a more
stringent test for the shell model than do the magic numbers. The level
sequences are found to be in good agreement with the calculated schemes.
However, some of the levels inside a major closed shell are quite close in
energy so that the sequences are not always strictly followed.

Magnetic Moments

Even-even nuclides having zero angular momentum also have zero magnetic
moment.The magnetic dipole moment of a nucleus can be finite only if
One can calculate the magnetic moments of odd-A nuclides. It is assumed that
the magnetic moment of such a nucleus is due entirely to the magnetic moment
of the last nucleon.

On the shell model each odd-even nucleus has a spherically symmetric set of
closed neutron and proton shells, surrounded by paired neutrons and protons,
again with J = 0 and therefore has no magnetic moment.

Entire angular momentum J is assigned to the resultant spin and orbital motion
of the one remaining odd nucleon and with that J , all the magnetic moment.

From this single-particle, the magnetic moment can be calculated, just as in the
atomic Zeeman effect, by the formulae of the vector model. The magnetic
moment vector in the sum of two contributions, one from whatever current is
produced by the orbital motion of the nucleon, the other from its intrinsic
magnetic moment.

In the addition of spin and orbital angular momentum to a total angular

momentum, the total magnetic moment vector no longer points in a direction
parallel (or antiparallel) to the vector j, because the g factors are different.
However, since the total angular momentum is conserved in the absence of
external torques, the vector

where the vector l and s are the orbital angular momentum and spin operators,
and the coefficients μp and μn the intrinsic magnetic moments of the two
nucleons in units of the nuclear magneton e/2Mc. The neutron orbitalmotion
does not produce electric current and makes no contribution to the magnetic
moment. The measured magnetic moments correspond to energies of
orientation in a magnetic field along which the total angular momentum j = l+s
is quantized while l and s precess about it. The tabulated magnetic moment μ
refer to the maximum value of the projected component of the moment along
the magnetic field direction, that is to that obtained when
Parity of Nuclei
With all the closed shells and the paired off nucleons having space symmetric
wave functions, the parity of a nucleus on the shell model is just that of the
orbital motion of the odd nucleon and is even or odd according to the character
of l, that is parity is even if l is even and parity is odd if l is odd. Since l is
determined by the magnetic moment in the ideal case, the measured magnetic
moments provide one check on theparity. The other important determination of
parity is provided by β-decay theory.The parity change in β-transitions, together
with the spin change determines the life time for a given energy release. The
predictions of the shell model have made possible a very orderly classification
of β transitions.

Nuclear Isomerism

An excited nuclear state which lives long enough to have a directly measurable
lifetime is called an isomeric state. Such a state decays by radioactivity which is
different from the ground state but must be assigned the same values of Z and
A. In a few cases several isomeric states are present. It is remarkable that of the
sixty or seventy isomers of half life greater than one second known, all occur in
“islands” of the periodic table, grouped just below the magic numbers, 50, 82
and 126. It is found that with two exceptions all isomers are found in four
distinct groups, the so-called “Islands of isomerism” given by

Criticism of the Shell Model

The shell model is an improvement upon the Fermi gas model in that a more
realistic potential is used and the spin-orbit interaction is taken into account. All
the magic numbers are correctly reproduced. The nuclei with closed shell are
correctly predicted to have zero spin and positive parity in the ground state.
Further, nuclei consisting of one nucleon outside a closed shell have the parity
and spin of that nucleon. The same argument can be used to assign the
values for a shell which is deficit by one nucleon for its completion,that is the
shell with a hole. Thus the shell model is very successful in predicting
ground-state angular momenta but is not so successful in describing
excited states and magnetic moments. It is therefore obvious that the shell
model gives an over simplified picture of the actual situation insidethe nucleus.
The assumption of a spherical symmetric potential is incorrect in mostof the
cases, evidenced by appreciable quadrupole moments possessed by some ofthe
nuclear states. The magnetic moments are also not predicted satisfactorily.
Little can be said about the nuclei which are in the middle of a major shell.