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# Limitations of the number selfconsistent Random Phase Approximation

## 1 Introduction

The random phase approximation (RPA) and its quasiparticle generalization (QRPA) have been widely used in the last decades to study electromagnetic transitions and beta decays in medium and heavy nuclei . The proton-neutron quasiparticle random phase approximation (pn-QRPA) has been extensively employed in the description of single and double beta decays in vibrational nuclei. However the RPA develops a collapse, i.e. it presents imaginary eigenvalues for strengths beyond a critical value of the force .

A whole family of extensions of the QRPA, called renormalized QRPA (RQRPA) are known that do not develop any collapse by implementing the Pauli principle in a consistent way, beyond the simplest quasiboson approximation . However, in its simplest versions there is a violation of the non energy weighted Ikeda sum rule . Calculations to determine the amount of the violation and some improvements to the RQRPA, in order to restore the sum rule, have been presented . It has been shown that treating simultaneously BCS and QRPA equations one can fulfil the Ikeda sum rule for the Fermi case when a schematic model is used .

In recent articles we studied the expectation values of the particle and quasiparticle numbers, the particle number fluctuations and the number of particle pairs with J=0, T=1 and J=1, T=0 in the ground state of 76Ge as a function of the residual proton-neutron interaction, using realistic Hilbert spaces . We found an important amount of particle number fluctuations in the RQRPA ground state beyond the QRPA collapse, pointing out a source of uncertainty in the RQRPA results. The analysis of the number of pairs showed that the isoscalar-isovector phase transition found in exact calculations is causing the QRPA collapse and is missed in the RQRPA formalism.

In the present work we go a step further, studying 76Ge with a renormalized RPA where at the same time the mean field is changed by minimizing the energy and fixing the number of particles in the correlated ground state. While particle number fluctuations are smaller than in the previous cases, they still exhibit a clear increase after the point of collapse. More remarkably, the pairing gap is strongly reduced in comparison with its experimental value, and the Ikeda sum rule is violated. Both results cast serious doubts about the double beta decay half-lives estimated using the QRPA extensions, in particular for those nuclei where standard QRPA calculations collapse . Together with the conclusions obtained in , we get a clear picture of the limitations associated with the QRPA extensions, which at the end are the same common sense ask for: you cannot allow the residual proton-neutron interaction to dictate the composition of the ground state wave function without missing contact with actual nuclei, even if the formalism allows you to overcome the collapse.

In Section 2 the renormalized gap and number equations are introduced, whose relationship with the RQRPA equations is shown in Section 3. Some relevant expectation values and the Ikeda sum rule are discussed in Section 4, results for 76Ge are presented in Section 5 and the conclusions in Section 6.

## 2 Renormalized Gap and Number Equations

In this section the gap and number equations are obtained minimizing the Hamiltonian expectation value $`0|H|0`$ in the correlated vacuum $`|0`$. The Hamiltonian is

$$H=H_p+H_n+H_{p,n}.$$
(1)
The first two terms refer to the proton and neutron hamiltonians

$$H_t=\underset{𝐭}{}(e_t\lambda )a_𝐭^{}a_𝐭+\frac{1}{2}\underset{𝐭^{}s}{}<𝐭_1𝐭_2|V|𝐭_3𝐭_4>a_{𝐭_1}^{}a_{𝐭_2}^{}a_{𝐭_4}a_{𝐭_3},$$
(2)
where the single particle energies are denoted by $`e_t`$, the chemical potential by $`\lambda `$, and the last term corresponds to the proton-neutron interaction

$$H_{p,n}=\underset{𝐩,𝐩^{},𝐧,𝐧^{}}{}<𝐩,𝐧|V|𝐩^{},𝐧^{}>a_𝐩^{}a_𝐧^{}a_𝐧^{}a_𝐩^{}.$$
(3)
The subscripts $`𝐭(t)`$ stand for $`𝐩(p)`$(protons) or $`𝐧(n)`$ (neutrons), being $`𝐭t,m_t`$, with $`t\{n_t,l_t,j_t\}`$ and $`m_tm_j`$.

Through the Bogoliubov transformation

$$\alpha _𝐭^{}=u_ta_𝐭^{}v_ta_{\overline{𝐭}},$$
(4)
with $`a_{\overline{𝐭}}=(1)^{t+m_t}a_{t,mt}`$, we get

$$H=U+\underset{p}{}2\mathrm{\Omega }_pϵ_p\widehat{𝒩}_p+\underset{n}{}2\mathrm{\Omega }_nϵ_n\widehat{𝒩}_n+H_{22}+H_{40}+H_{04}+H_{13}+H_{31},$$
(5)
being

$`\widehat{𝒩}_{tt^{}}{\displaystyle \frac{\left[\alpha _t^{}\alpha _{\overline{t^{}}}\right]^0}{\sqrt{2\mathrm{\Omega }_t}}},\widehat{𝒩}_t\widehat{𝒩}_{t=t^{}},\mathrm{\Omega }_t{\displaystyle \frac{(2j_t+1)}{2}},`$
and where $`U`$ and the quasiparticle energies $`ϵ_t`$ are defined as

$`U={\displaystyle \underset{t}{}}\left[2\mathrm{\Omega }_tv_t^2(e_t\lambda )+{\displaystyle \underset{t^{}}{}}\sqrt{\mathrm{\Omega }_t^{}\mathrm{\Omega }_t}v_t^2v_t^{}^2F(tt,t^{}t^{},0)\mathrm{\Omega }_tu_tv_t\mathrm{\Delta }_t\right],`$ (6)
$`ϵ_t=\left[e_t\lambda +{\displaystyle \underset{t^{}}{}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_t^{}}{\mathrm{\Omega }_t}}}v_t^{}^2F(tt,t^{}t^{},0)\right](v_t^2u_t^2)+2\mathrm{\Delta }_tu_tv_t`$ (7)
being

$`\mathrm{\Delta }_t=1/2{\displaystyle \underset{t^{}}{}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_t^{}}{\mathrm{\Omega }_t}}}u_t^{}v_t^{}G(tt,t^{}t^{},0),`$ (8)
the ’gap’ and F, G the usual particle-hole(PH) and particle-particle(PP) coupled two-particle matrix elements. The terms $`H_{nm}`$ in (5) destroy $`m`$ quasiparticles and creates $`n`$ quasiparticles, respectively.

To obtain the quasiparticle mean field occupations $`v_i`$ the ground state energy $`0|H|0`$ is minimized, i.e. it is asked that

$`{\displaystyle \frac{}{v}}0|H|0=0,`$ (9)
subject to the constrictions

$$0|\widehat{N}|0=N,0|\widehat{Z}|0=Z,$$
(10)
and the normalization $`u_i^2+v_i^2=1`$, being $`\widehat{N}`$ and $`\widehat{Z}`$ the neutron and proton particle number operators respectively.

The standard BCS procedure treats protons and neutrons separately and in Hamiltonian (5) only pairing interactions, refering in general to like particles interacting through the J=0 channel, are included . In this case the ground state energy is just U as defined in Eq. (6) and $`|0`$ is the BCS ground state. The residual interactions, either between like particles or protons and neutrons, represented by the terms $`H_{nm}`$ in (5), are usually included in a second step, most commonly using the QRPA .

One of the drawbacks of this procedure is that Eq. (10) is only enforced for the BCS vacuum. When residual interactions are present the expectation values of the particle number operators do not coincide with the actual number. The SCRPA  is designed to overcome this difficulty by solving Eq (9) and (10) using the RPA vacuum.

Full selfconsistency requires to consider the proton-neutron interaction contribution in the minimization, but the system of equations which describes this problem is nonlinear and rather complicated, and has only be implemented in schematic models . In order to perform calculations in realistic Hilbert spaces we will include in this first step only the like-particles part of the Hamiltonian, while the ground state $`|0`$ will be sensitive to proton-neutron interaction through the RPA equations, following a philosophy close to Ref . From here on we will refer to this approximation as SRQRPA. We are absolutely aware that our treatment is not fully self-consistent. We are just meeting the requirements of Eq. (10) for the RPA vacuum, and including the modifications in the mean field due to pn-correlations at the lowest level. However, as is shown below, even this mild modifications have very important effects in the observables of the system.

Following , but including only the modifications of the gap equations due to use of the RPA vacuum instead of the BCS vacuum, i.e. not taking into account the proton-neutron residual interaction explicitly, we arrive to the modified gap equation

$`2(\overline{e_t}\lambda )v_tu_t(u_t^2v_t^2)\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Delta }}_t=0,`$ (11)
where

$`\overline{e}_t=e_t+{\displaystyle \underset{t^{}}{}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_t^{}}{\mathrm{\Omega }_t}}}v_t^{}^2F(tt,t^{}t^{},0))`$ (12)
is the single particle energy corrected by the self-energy and

$`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Delta }}_t=1/2{\displaystyle \underset{t^{}}{}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_t^{}}{\mathrm{\Omega }_t}}}u_t^{}v_t^{}G(tt,t^{}t^{},0)(120|\widehat{𝒩}_t^{}|0),`$ (13)
the ’renormalized’ gap. Notice that the pairing interaction appears in the gap equation renormalized by the presence of proton-neutron residual interactions, which introduce a finite number of quasiparticles in the RPA vacuum . For the sake of simplicity we have dropped some higher order terms in Eq. (11) which come from the interaction between like particles connecting the many quasiparticle components of the correlated ground state. The definition of the renormalized gap (13) is unique at this level of approximation . This is an important definition to be kept in mind, because the factor $`(120|\widehat{𝒩}_t^{}|0)`$ will play a definite role in suppressing the gap when proton-neutron residual interactions are large.

What remains is to couple the renormalized gap problem with the RQRPA equations.

## 3 RQRPA

The nuclear excited states are constructed as

$$|\lambda JM\mathrm{\Omega }^{}(\lambda JM)|0,$$
(14)
$$\mathrm{\Omega }^{}(\lambda JM)=\underset{pn}{}\left[X_{pn}(\lambda J)A_{pn}^{}(JM)Y_{pn}(\lambda J)A_{pn}(\overline{JM})\right],$$
(15)
where

$$\widehat{A}_{pn}^{}(JM)[\alpha _p^{}\alpha _n^{}]^{JM}D_{pn}^{1/2},D_{pn}\left(10|\widehat{𝒩}_p+\widehat{𝒩}_n|0\right),$$
(16)
are the renormalized two-quasiparticle proton-neutron creation operators, which satisfy

$$0|[A_{pn}(JM),A_{p^{}n^{}}^{}(J^{}M^{})]|0=\delta _{pp^{}}\delta _{nn^{}}\delta _{JJ^{}}\delta _{MM^{}}.$$
(17)
Here $`|0`$ is the RPA correlated ground state, defined by the condition

$$\mathrm{\Omega }(\lambda JM)|0=0.$$
(18)
Each amplitudes $`X_{pn}(\lambda J)`$ and $`Y_{pn}(\lambda J)`$ are associated with the excitation energy $`\omega _{\lambda J}`$ of the $`\lambda `$-th state with angular momentum $`J`$. They are the eigenvectors and eigenvalues, respectively, of the RPA equations

$`\left(\begin{array}{cc}A(J)\hfill & B(J)\hfill \\ B^{}(J)\hfill & A^{}(J)\hfill \end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{c}X(\lambda J)\hfill \\ Y(\lambda J)\hfill \end{array}\right)=\omega _{\lambda J}\left(\begin{array}{c}X(\lambda J)\hfill \\ Y(\lambda J)\hfill \end{array}\right),`$ (25)
where

$`A_{pn,p^{}n^{}}(J)`$ $`=`$ $`(ϵ_p+ϵ_n)\delta _{pp^{}}\delta _{nn^{}}+D_{pn}^{1/2}U_{pn,p^{}n^{}}^{}(J)D_{p^{}n^{}}^{1/2},`$
$`B_{pn,p^{}n^{}}(J)`$ $`=`$ $`D_{pn}^{1/2}U_{pn,p^{}n^{}}^{}(J)D_{p^{}n^{}}^{1/2},`$ (26)
with

$`U_{pn,p^{}n^{}}^{}(J)`$ $`=`$ $`G(pn,p^{}n^{},JM)(u_pu_nu_p^{}u_n^{}+v_pv_nv_p^{}v_n^{})`$
$`+`$ $`F(pn,p^{}n^{},JM)(u_pv_nu_p^{}v_n^{}+v_pu_nv_p^{}u_n^{}),`$
$`U_{pn,p^{}n^{}}^{}(J)`$ $`=`$ $`G(pn,p^{}n^{},JM)(u_pu_nv_p^{}v_n^{}+v_pv_nu_p^{}u_n^{})`$ (27)
$`+`$ $`F(pn,p^{}n^{},JM)(v_pu_nu_p^{}v_n^{}+u_pv_nv_p^{}u_n^{}).`$
The RPA equations (25) depend explicitly on the mean field occupations $`v_i`$ through the A and B matrices defined in (26) and (27). At the same time, the quasiparticle occupations $`v_i`$ depend on the RPA amplitudes $`X,Y`$, on which depend also $`|0`$, through the renormalized gap equation (11) and number equations (10).

## 4 Expectation values in the correlated RPA vacuum

Using the quasi-boson approximation

$$[A_{pn}(JM),A_{p^{}n^{}}^{}(J^{}M^{})]0|[A_{pn}(JM),A_{p^{}n^{}}^{}(J^{}M^{})]|0=\delta _{pp^{}}\delta _{nn^{}}\delta _{JJ^{}}\delta _{MM^{}},$$
(28)
the RPA ground state defined by Eq.(18) can be written as

$$|0=N_0e^{\widehat{S}}|BCS,$$
(29)
with the BCS vacuum defined by the property

$$\alpha _t|BCS=0,$$
(30)
and

$`\widehat{S}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle \underset{pnp^{}n^{}J}{}}\sqrt{(2J+1)}C(J)_{pnp^{}n^{}}\left[A_{pn}^{}(J)A_{p^{}n^{}}^{}(J)\right]^0,`$ (31)
$`C(J)_{pnp^{}n^{}}={\displaystyle \underset{\lambda }{}}Y(J)_{pn,\lambda }^{}X(J)_{\lambda ,p^{}n^{}}^^1.`$
The quasiparticle occupations $`0|\widehat{𝒩}_t|0`$ evaluated using the QRPA vacuum (29) have the explicit form

$`0|\widehat{𝒩}_p|0`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{\lambda Jn^{}}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{(2J+1)}{2\mathrm{\Omega }_p}}D_{pn^{}}|Y(J)_{pn^{},\lambda }|^2,`$
$`0|\widehat{𝒩}_n|0`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{\lambda Jp^{}}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{(2J+1)}{2\mathrm{\Omega }_n}}D_{p^{}n}|Y(J)_{p^{}n,\lambda }|^2,`$ (32)
The mean particle numbers of protons and neutrons are

$`Z0|\widehat{𝒵}|0=2{\displaystyle \underset{p}{}}\mathrm{\Omega }_pv_p^2+2{\displaystyle \underset{p}{}}\mathrm{\Omega }_p(u_p^2v_p^2)0|\widehat{𝒩}_p|0,`$ (33)
$`N0|\widehat{𝒩}|0=2{\displaystyle \underset{n}{}}\mathrm{\Omega }_nv_n^2+2{\displaystyle \underset{n}{}}\mathrm{\Omega }_n(u_n^2v_n^2)0|\widehat{𝒩}_n|0,`$
When the BCS vacuum is used, the second term in each of these expressions vanish and one is left with the usual number equation. When the residual interaction is present these terms have a relevant contribution to the particle number . They are included in the present work in a selfconsistent way by modifying the mean field occupations $`v_p,v_n`$ to obtain the correct number of particles in the correlated RPA vacuum.

The Fermi transition operators are written in terms of the pair creation and annihilation operators as

$$\tau ^{}=\underset{pn}{}[v_pu_n[\alpha _p^{}\alpha _n^{}]^{00}+u_pv_n[\alpha _p\alpha _n]^{00}],\tau ^+=\{\tau ^{}\}^{}$$
(34)
which are not the exact expressions because they are missing the scattering terms which create a proton (neutron) quasiparticle and annihilates a neutron (proton) quasiparticle.

The total strengths $`S_\pm `$ associated with these transition operators are

$$S_\pm =\underset{\lambda }{}|\lambda J=0|\tau ^\pm |0|^2.$$
(35)
The Ikeda sum rule states that, when the exact operators $`\tau ^\pm `$ are used, and when the set of states $`|\lambda `$ is a complete one, including all the states in the odd-odd nuclei which can be connected with the ground state $`|0`$ of the even-even nuclei through the transition operators, then

$$S_{}S_+=NZ$$
(36)
However, in the present case the Fermi transition operators are truncated, and the strengths difference has a more complicated form

$$S_{}S_+=0|\widehat{N}\widehat{Z}|0\underset{pn}{}(u_n^2v_p^2)0|\widehat{𝒩}_n\widehat{𝒩}_p|0.$$
(37)
The first term is equivalent to $`NZ`$ due to the constrictions (10). The second term gives rise to the violation of the Ikeda sum rule (36). When the BCS vacuum is employed, these term has no contribution. For this reason the standard pn-QRPA fulfils the Ikeda sum rule. There are some special cases in which the proton and neutron quasiparticle occupations in the ground state are equal, and this term also vanishes, as it was found in the SO(5) model  and in the single mode model of the RQRPA . Only when the sum in (32) is restricted to $`J=0`$, forcing $`j_p=j_n`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p=\mathrm{\Omega }_n`$, it is true that $`0|\widehat{𝒩}_n\widehat{𝒩}_p|0=0`$ for each level. In the present case, when a realistic Hilbert space is employed and the sum over different J’s is included in (32), those occupations are not equal and the Ikeda sum rule is violated. It is worth to mention that, while in general the quasiparticle occupations for protons and neutrons are different, the expectation value of the total number of quasiparticles $`N_{qp}_𝐭0|\widehat{𝒩}_t|0`$ is the same, as can be easily seen making the sum in Eq. (32).

## 5 Results

In the present work we study Fermi beta excitations in 76Ge. We adopt a $`\delta `$-type residual interaction already used previously , and our Hilbert space has six single particle energy levels, including all the single-particle orbitals from oscillator shells $`3\mathrm{}\omega `$ plus $`1g_{9/2}`$ and $`1g_{7/2}`$ from the $`4\mathrm{}\omega `$ oscillator shell. They were obtained using a Coulomb-corrected Wood-Saxon potential. Their numerical values for 76Ge are tabulated in Table 1 of ref. . We include $`J^\pi =0^\pm ,..,3^\pm `$ in the sums in Eq.(32).

In order to describe the dependence of the various observables on the proton-neutron residual interaction we use the parameter

$$\mathrm{s}=\frac{v_{\mathrm{𝐩𝐧}}^{pp}}{v^{pair}},$$

which is the ratio between the coupling constant in the proton-neutron $`J=0`$ particle-particle channel and the pairing force constant $`v^{pair}=(v_{\mathrm{𝐩𝐩}}^{pair}+v_{\mathrm{𝐧𝐧}}^{pair})/2`$. We compare results obtained within the usual QRPA with those coming from the RQRPA (no mean field modification), and the SRQRPA.

In Fig. 1 we show the lowest $`J^\pi =0^+`$ excitation energies $`\omega `$ (in MeV) in 76As, calculated from the 76Ge ground state, for the QRPA (dotted lines), RQRPA (dashed lines) , and SRQRPA (full lines) approximations, as a function of the residual interaction parameter $`\mathrm{s}`$. It can be clearly seen that the excitation energy goes to zero, and collapses around $`\mathrm{s}=2.5`$ for the QRPA, while in the RQRPA and SRQRPA formalisms the collapse is avoided, although the excitation energies predicted after the collapse in these two approaches differ by a factor two.

In Figure 2 the sum rule $`S_{}S_+`$, normalized to the Ikeda value $`NZ`$, is presented as a function of $`\mathrm{s}`$ with the same convention of Fig. 1. While in the QRPA the Ikeda sum rule is always fulfiled, in the other cases it is violated. Notice that, having the correct number of protons and neutrons in the correlated ground state, the SRQRPA departs less from $`NZ`$ that the RQRPA, but the departure is anyway noticeably. It is important to point out that, in the present calculations, even when $`\mathrm{s}=0`$ the other proton-neutron residual interaction channels, for $`J0`$, are present and have a finite value. For this reason there is a violation of the Ikeda sum rule at $`\mathrm{s}=0`$.

To describe in more detail the above mentioned point we present in Figure 3 the total number of quasiparticles as a function of $`\mathrm{s}`$. When only $`J=0`$ states are included in the sum in Eq. (32) the number of quasiparticles goes to zero when $`\mathrm{s}`$ is zero. In the other three cases the residual interaction in the other channels is present and increase this number.

The fluctuations in the particle number $`\mathrm{\Delta }N\sqrt{0|(\widehat{N}N)^2|0}`$ represent a warning about the region of applicability of the different QRPA models . They are shown in Fig. 4a (for protons) and Fig. 4b (for neutrons) as a function of $`\mathrm{s}`$. It is interesting to note that the pure BCS fluctuations $`\mathrm{\Delta }N=2\sqrt{_t\mathrm{\Omega }_t^2u_t^2v_t^2}`$ diminish when the pn residual interaction increases, due to the sharpening in the particle distribution when the mean field is varied to keep the number of particles in their right value. In the SRQRPA these fluctuations diminish slightly at first, dominated by this mean field effect, to increase in a noticeably way after the QRPA collapse. The QRPA results for the total quasiparticle number and the particle number fluctuations explode for $`s2.5`$ when only the $`J^\pi =0^+`$ contribution is included in Eq. (32). When all the angular momentum contributions are taken into account the $`J^\pi =1^+`$ component collapses around $`s=2.3`$, and these expectation values diverge.

The single particle occupation numbers $`v_p^2,v_n^2`$ are presented in Figure 5 as a function of the single particle energies. While only six levels are in use, the curves represent their smoothed values. It can be seen that both protons and neutrons have their distributions sharpened, i.e. the larger $`\mathrm{s}`$ the more they resemble a step distribution, although this effect is more evident for protons.

The behavior of the pairing energy gap as a function of $`\mathrm{s}`$ is shown in Fig. 6a (for protons) and Fig. 6b (for neutrons). As advanced in the previous section, the pairing gaps, while different for the different single particle levels, all behave the same way. They show a strong reduction when $`\mathrm{s}`$ increases, down to one half of the original value. This is not a curiosity: the pairing energy gap is observable, and any attempt to properly describe the beta decay using the QRPA extensions must keep the descriptive power of the simplest formalism, the QRPA, where the pairing constants are adjusted to reproduce the observed gap.

## 6 Conclusions

A study of the beta decay of 76Ge using the SRQRPA was presented. The mean field gap and number equations were introduced and solved together with the RQRPA equations, but the selfconsistency was only included to guarantee the good number of particles in the correlated ground state.

The Ikeda sum rule was studied in some detail. It is known to be fulfiled in standard pn-QRPA calculations , violated in RQRPA ones  and recovered when self-consistent RQRPA calculations are performed in simple models. In the present work it was shown that the Ikeda sum rule is violated when a realistic Hilbert space is used in spite of using the number selfconsistent QRPA approach.

The most remarkable phenomenon found in the calculation was the strong reduction of the pairing gap. In the presence of the proton-neutron residual interaction the mean field changes needed to have the correct number of particles generate sharper distributions for the occupations of single particle states, visible when plotting $`v^2`$ as a function of the single particle energies for different values of $`\mathrm{s}`$. At the same time, it strongly reduces the energy gap, which can be as small as a half of the observed value.

Having in mind the various merits of the renormalized and self-consistent extensions of the quasiparticle random phase approximation, we conclude that it must be used with extreme caution in the region where the standard QRPA collapse. Not only the particle number fluctuations have a clear increase, but observable quantities depart from their measured values.

## 7 Acknowledgements

This work was supported in part by Conacyt, México.

Figures caption

Figure 1. Lowest $`J^\pi =0^+`$ excitation energies in 76As, calculated from the 76Ge ground state, for the QRPA, RQRPA, and SRQRPA approximations, as function of the residual interaction parameter $`\mathrm{s}`$.

Figure 2. Fermi sum rule $`S_{}S_+`$, normalized to the Ikeda value $`NZ`$, as function of $`\mathrm{s}`$ with the same line conventions used in fig. 1.

Figure 3. Total quasiparticle number (equal for protons and neutrons) evolution as function of $`\mathrm{s}`$. The result for the QRPA case when the sums in Eq. (26) are restricted to $`J^\pi =0^+`$ is also shown.

Figure 4. Proton (a) and neutron (b) number fluctuations obtained using the BCS, QRPA with only $`J^\pi =0^+`$ and all the $`J`$’s in Eq. (32), RQRPA and SRQRPA descriptions.

Figure 5. Single particle occupation numbers $`v_p^2`$ (thick lines), and $`v_n^2`$ (thin lines) as a smoothed function of the single particle energies $`e`$, for the values $`s=0.,2.5`$, and $`3.1`$ of the residual interaction parameter.

Figure 6. Evolution of the pairing energy gap as a function of $`\mathrm{s}`$ for protons (a) and for neutrons (b).