Publication Type
Journal
Journal Name
Physical Review Letters
Publication Date
Volume
110
Issue
19
Abstract
We optimize the nucleon-nucleon interaction from chiral effective field theory at next-to-next-toleading order (NNLO). The resulting new chiral force NNLOopt yields 2 1 per degree of freedom for
laboratory energies below approximately 125 MeV. In the A ¼ 3, 4 nucleon systems, the contributions of three-nucleon forces are smaller than for previous parametrizations of chiral interactions. We use
NNLOopt to study properties of key nuclei and neutron matter, and we demonstrate that many aspects of nuclear structure can be understood in terms of this nucleon-nucleon interaction, without explicitly
invoking three-nucleon forces.
