Ab Initio Description of Open-Shell Nuclei: Merging No-Core Shell Model and In-Medium Similarity Renormalization Group.

We merge two successful ab initio nuclear-structure methods, the no-core shell model (NCSM) and the multireference in-medium similarity renormalization group (IM-SRG) to define a new many-body approach for the comprehensive description of ground and excited states of closed and open-shell nuclei. Building on the key advantages of the two methods-the decoupling of excitations at the many-body level in the IM-SRG and the access to arbitrary nuclei, eigenstates, and observables in the NCSM-their combination enables fully converged no-core calculations for an unprecedented range of nuclei and observables at moderate computational cost. We present applications in the carbon and oxygen isotopic chains, where conventional NCSM calculations are still feasible and provide an important benchmark.

Medium-mass nuclei with normal-ordered chiral NN+3N interactions.

We study the use of truncated normal-ordered three-nucleon interactions in nuclear structure calculations starting from chiral two- plus three-nucleon Hamiltonians evolved consistently with the similarity renormalization group. We present three key developments: (i) a rigorous benchmark of the normal-ordering approximation in the importance-truncated no-core shell model for (4)He, (16)O, and (40)Ca; (ii) a direct comparison of the importance-truncated no-core shell model results with coupled-cluster calculations at the singles and doubles level for (16)O; and (iii) first applications of similarity renormalization group-evolved chiral NN+3N Hamiltonians in coupled-cluster calculations for medium-mass nuclei (16,24)O and (40,48)Ca. We show that the normal-ordered two-body approximation works very well beyond the lightest isotopes and opens a path for studies of medium-mass and heavy nuclei with chiral two- plus three-nucleon interactions.