Structure of and E2 transition in 16C in a 14C + n+n model -: art. no. 037304

A three-body model of C-14 +n+n is applied to study the energy spectrum and the hindered E2 transition in C-16. A realistic two-nucleon potential is used for the valence neutrons. Both spin-singlet and spin-triplet components for the neutrons are taken into account. The three-body problem with a Pauli constraint is solved in a stochastic variational method. For the n-C-14 potential chosen to reproduce the properties of C-15, the low-lying energy spectrum agrees reasonably well with experiment, but the ground state is predicted to be about 1 MeV high. The calculated B(E2; 2(1)(+)-> 0(1)(+)) value is about twice the measured value if the polarization charge of the valence neutrons is taken to be the same as that required to fit the C-15 data. The correlated motion of the valence neutrons is displayed through the two-neutron density distribution.