A RELATIVISTIC THEORY OF SUPERDEFORMATIONS IN RAPIDLY ROTATING NUCLEI

Superdeformed shapes in rapidly rotating nuclei are investigated in the framework of a cranked relativistic mean field theory. A well established parameter set containing a non-linear self-coupling between the σ-mesons is used. Excellent agreement with experimental data in the nucleus 152Dy is achieved and new superdeformed bands in 80Sr are predicted. It turns out that the spatial components of the vector ω-mesons (nuclear magnetism), which are usually neglected in applications of this theory for small angular momenta, play an important role for a quantitative understanding of the moments of inertia in these superdeformed shapes. © 1990.