Rod-shaped Nuclei at Extreme Spin and Isospin

Understand

The anomalous rod shape in carbon isotopes has been investigated in the framework of the cranking covariant density functional theory, and two mechanisms to stabilize such a novel shape with respect to the bending motion, extreme spin, and isospin, are simultaneously discussed for the first time in a self-consistent and microscopic way.

• By adding valence neutrons and rotating the system, we have found the mechanism stabilizing the rod shape; i.e., the $\sigma$ orbitals (parallel to the symmetry axis) of the valence neutrons, important for the rod shape, are lowered by the rotation due to the Coriolis term.
• The spin and isospin effects enhance the stability of the rod-shaped configuration.
• This provides a strong hint that a rod shape could be realized in nuclei towards extreme spin and isospin.