High-order perturbative calculations of nuclear ground states: Automated evaluation of many-body diagrams

Abstract

We advance the many-body perturbation theory (MBPT) calculations of the ground-state energy and radius of closed-shell nuclei beyond third order. Using automated diagram generation and evaluation up to fifth order, we present ground-state properties of selected closed-shell nuclei up to $^{78}$Ni with two- and three-nucleon interactions derived from chiral effective field theory. A clear convergence trend is observed for the ground-state energy enabling calculations at improved accuracy. We further investigate in detail the decomposition of the fourth-order contributions. For the ground-state energy, the magnitude of the fourth-order contribution is typically less than half of the third order, and a typical cancellation among different classes of diagrams is observed. Finally, we perform a comprehensive comparison between MBPT and non-perturbative in-medium similarity renormalization group (IMSRG) calculations, with the goal to provide insight into many-body uncertainties associated with the IMSRG(2) truncation.