Physics Colloquium: The search for multineutron systems

Abstract: 

Whether multi-neutron systems can exist as weakly bound states or very short-lived unbound resonant states has been a long-standing quest. The discovery of such a system would have far-reaching implications for many aspects of nuclear physics, from the nature of the force itself up to the way it builds nuclei, and also for the modeling of neutron stars. The experimental search for isolated multi-neutron systems has been going for six decades, with a particular focus on the four-neutron system called tetraneutron, resulting in up to date only few indications for its existence, leaving it an elusive nuclear system. I will start with an overview of the numerous attempts that have been made to find a hint for the existence of the tetraneutron system, and continue with our recent experiment performed at the RIKEN Nishina Center located in Japan. There using a new experimental approach based on a knockout reaction with radioactive high-energy 8He beam we investigated the four-neutron system.

Event Organizer: Prof. Lev Vaidman