Determine the neutron skin type by relativistic isobaric collisions
H. Xu, Hanlin Li, Xiaobao Wang, Caiwan Shen, F. Wang
Abstract
The effects of neutron skin on the multiplicity (Nch) and eccentricity (ϵ2) in relativistic 4496Ru+4496Ru and 4096Zr+4096Zr collisions at sNN=200 GeV are investigated with the Trento model. It is found that the Ru+Ru/Zr+Zr ratios of the Nch distributions and ϵ2 in mid-central collisions are exquisitely sensitive to the neutron skin type (skin vs. halo). The state-of-the-art calculations by energy density functional theory (DFT) favor the halo-type neutron skin and can soon be confronted by experimental data. It is demonstrated that the halo-type density can serve as a good surrogate for the DFT density, and thus can be efficiently employed to probe nuclear deformities by using elliptic flow data in central collisions. We provide hereby a proof-of-principle venue to simultaneously determine the neutron skin type, thickness, and nuclear deformity.