Competition of isoscalar and isovector proton-neutron pairing in nuclei Original Research Article

We use shell model techniques in the complete pf shell to study pair correlations in nuclei. Particular attention is paid to the competition of isoscalar and isovector proton-neutron pairing modes which is investigated in the odd-odd N = Z nucleus 46V and in the chain of even Fe-isotopes. We confirm the dominance of isovector pairing in the ground states. An inspection of the level density and pair correlation strength in 46V, however, shows the increasing relative importance of isoscalar correlations with increasing excitation energy. In the Fe-isotopes we find the expected strong dependence of the proton-neutron isovector pairing strength on the neutron excess, while the dominant J = 1 isoscalar pair correlations scale much more gently with neutron number. We demonstrate that the isoscalar pair correlations depend strongly on the spin-orbit splitting.