Generalized isobaric multiplet mass equation and its application to the Nolen-Schiffer anomaly

The Wigner Isobaric Multiplet Mass Equation (IMME) is the most fundamental prediction in nuclear physics with the concept of isospin. However, it was deduced based on the Wigner-Eckart theorem with the assumption that all charge-violating interactions can be written as tensors of rank two. In the present work, the charge-symmetry breaking (CSB) and charge-independent breaking (CIB) components of the nucleon-nucleon force, which contribute to the effective interaction in nuclear medium, are established in the framework of Brueckner theory with AV18 and AV14 bare interactions. Because such charge-violating components can no longer be expressed as an irreducible tensor due to density dependence, its matrix element cannot be analytically reduced by the Wigner-Eckart theorem. With an alternative approach, we derive a generalized IMME (GIMME) that modifies the coefficients of the original IMME. As the first application of GIMME, we study the long-standing question for the origin of the Nolen-Schiffer anomaly found in the Coulomb displacement energy of mirror nuclei. We find that the naturally-emerged CSB term in GIMME is largely responsible for explaining the Nolen-Schiffer anomaly.
Comment: 7 pages, 3 figures; to be published in Phys. Rev. C