Recent data provide evidence for coexisting phases at low energy in the spherical-deformed transitional nucleus ¹⁵²Sm. The nature of the wave functions at the spherical-deformed phase transition in nuclei is analyzed within the framework of the interacting-boson model. It is shown that in the U(5)-SU(3) transition, two phases coexist in a very small region of parameter space around the critical value of the control parameter ξ. The coexistence region with two minima in the potential shrinks to zero as one moves to the U(5)-O(6) transition. Implications for other systems are briefly mentioned.
No takes yet. Share an insight, caveat, or question.
Iachello et al. (1998) studied this question.