There are still surprises left in the nuclear shell model

Calvin W. Johnson (San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, USA)

The nuclear shell model is a venerable and flexible tool for understanding nuclear structure, but after more than seventy-five years one might think no surprises remain. By way of contrast, I present two tales of unexpected results using the shell model. In the first, ab initio no-core shell model calculations of electric octupole (E3) transitions in light nuclei present interesting patterns that have unusual diagnoses. In the second, I show how one can, again in a no-core shell model picture, reproduce low-energy scattering of neutrons off light nuclei in calculations that require only matrices of tiny dimensions.