Doubly-magic nature of 56Ni: measurement of the ground state nuclear magnetic dipole moment of 55Ni

Abstract

The nuclear magnetic moment of the ground state of $^{55}$Ni ($I^π=3/2^{-}, T_{1/2}=204$ ms) has been deduced to be $|μ$^{55}Ni)$|=(0.976 \pm 0.026)$ $μ_N$ using the $β$-NMR technique. Results of a shell model calculation in the full \textit{fp} shell model space with the GXPF1 interaction reproduce the experimental value. Together with the known magnetic moment of the mirror partner $^{55}$Co, the isoscalar spin expectation value was extracted as $<\sum σ_z >=0.91 \pm 0.07$. The $<\sum σ_z>$ shows a similar trend as that established in the \textit{sd} shell. The present theoretical interpretations of both $μ(^{55}$Ni) and $<\sum σ_z>$ for the $T=1/2$, A=55 mirror partners support the softness of the $^{56}$Ni core.

13 pages, 1 figure, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. C