Ab-initio calculation of the photonuclear cross section of $^{10}$B

Abstract

We present for the first-time the photonuclear cross section of $^{10}$B calculated within the ab-initio No Core Shell Model framework. Realistic two-nucleon (NN) chiral forces up to next-to-next-to-next-order (N3LO), which have been softened by the similarity renormalization group method (SRG) to $\lambda=2.02$ fm$^{-1}$, were utilized. The electric-dipole response function is calculated using the Lanczos method. The effects of the continuum were accounted for by including neutron escape widths derived from R-matrix theory. The calculated cross section agrees well with experimental data in terms of structure as well as in absolute peak height, $\sigma_{\rm max}=4.85~{\rm mb}$ at photon energy $\omega=23.61~{\rm MeV}$, and integrated cross section $85.36\, {\rm MeV \cdotp mb}$. We test the Brink hypothesis by calculating the electric-dipole response for the first five positive-parity states in $^{10}$B and verify that dipole excitations built upon the ground- and excited states have similar characteristics.