Significance of Symplectic Symmetry in Many-nucleon Dynamics

Understanding the origin, structure, and phases of hadronic matter is a forefront research area in physics. An integral part of this challenge is to achieve realistic modeling of the complex dynamics of atomic nuclei, which is key to comprehending the evolution of the universe from a fundamental quark/gluon level. But understanding nuclear structure at this level, especially for systems far from stability, remains beyond reach of the most sophisticated of modern theories. The dual challenge of strong interactions that preclude perturbative treatments and the complexities of the quantum many-particle system that admit correlated phenomena and cluster substructures places exceptional demands on both physics and computational science. We recently demonstrated the potential power of an innovative concept, the ab initio symplectic no-core shell model (Sp-NCSM), based on expanding the conventional harmonic oscillator basis in terms of the symmetry-adapted and physically relevant symplectic basis, to reach new domains of nuclear structure. Using realistic interactions tied to Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD), the Sp-NCSM approach holds promise to build the bridge from QCD to measured properties of light nuclei, predict diverse features of unstable nuclei crucial for astrophysical processes, and provide nuclear structure information essential for cosmology and probing physics beyond the standard model.